


Boys At Sea

by hutchynstarsk



Category: Starsky and Hutch - Fandom
Genre: AU, Angst, Bromance, Disabilities, Gen, Injury, Islands, Male Friendship, Sailing, Sea AU, Stranded, Survival, early American naval stuff, h/c, midshipmen, sailors, sea dogs, sea story, wooden ships and iron men
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-09-11
Updated: 2012-09-11
Packaged: 2017-11-13 18:36:14
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 18
Words: 43,737
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/506474
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hutchynstarsk/pseuds/hutchynstarsk
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Hutch gets sent to sea, he meets a sailor boy his age named Starsky.  Neither expect to become the best of friends--or all the danger that awaits them.</p><p>Rated Mature for violence, brutality, and injuries.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> With thanks to Barancoire for the beta help, encouragement, and suggestions. Wouldn't have finished it without you, babe.
> 
> Also with thanks to Hutcherie for the art. :)

See the beautiful art by Renate: <http://hutcherie.livejournal.com/16443.html>

　#

_A Starsky and Hutch story_

‘I think it would please you to watch the formation of a community so close-packed and eventually so tight-knit as the crew of a ship…. Remarkably strong and lasting friendships are formed, particularly on very long voyages.’

‘They have become close companions, which could scarcely be the case on land, their origins, nurture, and manner of speech being so very far apart.’

—Stephen Maturin, pg. 136, Blue at the Mizzen, by Patrick O’Brian

　

　

Boys At Sea

  
by Allie

Chapter one

　

Hutch groaned. Why wasn’t he dead yet? He’d puked up his guts for long enough. He groaned, and his head hit the pillow again. The ship was still heaving like an angry, drunken rocking horse.

Outside the cabin, he could hear the creaking of ropes and spars, sails, and the very wood of the ship. It seemed all it did was creak. Oh, and now he heard a whistle—and the haranguing voice of that man who always shouted. Pattering feet ran to obey his orders; more ropes creaked.

Hutch groaned and rolled his face to the wall. He was going to die; that was all. If only his father hadn’t sent him to sea.

The door burst open and slammed against the wall.

"Howdy, Lubber!" called a cheerful voice with a strong northern accent. Hutch squinted miserably up. There stood a curly-haired young man grinning cheerfully down at him. "Doc sent me to bring you water and change your sick bucket." He laughed, and said in a cheerful voice, "Really green in the stomach, eh? Me, I never get sick—no, sir. I’m more at home on the sea than I am on land. Back and forth—up and down—gales that leave the ship half drowned, can’t hurt me. Side to side—swaying and churning—it’s all fine with me."

"Urgh." Hutch wretched, and lunged for the bucket. He made it barely in time.

The dark-haired sailor drew back. "Somethin’ I said? Well, here, I’ll leave the water. If you want some food…"

"GAH!" Hutch clutched the bucket with weak, knuckle-whitened hands. "GO AWAY!" Except his teeth were clamped together, so it sounded like "GORAY!"

"Guess I’ll go away," said the curly-headed sailor, sounding mystified and a little offended.

The doctor visited later, but he cheerfully proclaimed Hutch fine and told him he’d soon be up and about. All while Hutch lay pale and green and dying, mind you. He wouldn’t even send Huggy in to visit him and help him with his last will and testament.

"The boy’s working—knows more about the ship already than you’ll know in two months."

Hutch glared up at the surgeon, the bespectacled, wiry man with graying, thin hair, and a painfully cheerful manner. He could at least have some respect for the dying!

He looked down at Hutch then, and gave him an awkward pat on the wrist. "You’ll adjust, though. I’ll send some soup down this evening. You should be well enough for it by then."

Hutch moaned.

#

"Like your soup hot? If so, ya better sit up and eat it!" The curly-headed monster was back. Hutch clutched the blankets higher over his now-shirtless chest. He pulled them to his chin and glared at the boy. He was probably about Hutch’s age, deeply tanned, dark-haired and sporting an array of body hair; thick on his arms, and visible past the deep V of his shirt open at the neck. He had a disreputable but highly cheerful sort of charm about him, a big smile and a bouncy step. He obviously knew his way around a ship.

"Here ya go. Cap’n said you’d be up to meet everyone soon. I guess I’d better be respectful—since you’re the new middy an’ all." He gave a quick, rather sloppy salute and another grin, his eyes taking in Hutch with frank curiosity. "Only you’re really a lubber so it’s hard…" He smirked a little, at the way Hutch held the sheet up. "A little shy, are we? You really haven’t been on a ship before, have you?"

"Go away," mumbled Hutch, turning his face to the wall. No, it would look like pouting. He turned back. "For your information, I’m going to breed horses when I’m older—not have anything to do with the sea."

"Hey." Starsky raised his hands. "I’m gonna be the admiral of the whole buggering United States Navy. But till then you’re stuck with us real sea dogs. Enjoy your soup." He gave Hutch a wink, and swaggered from the cabin.

Hutch glared after him, hating every confident inch of him.

He did sit up and eat some soup, however. He was finally feeling well enough, and after two days and three nights, glad enough for it.

#

The next day he was well enough to go on deck, and look around and smell the salt air. The doctor told him he was well enough for breakfast, and to dress for it. He would eat with the officers, even though he was just a midshipman.

Today would be his third full day at sea, but it felt like the first, since he could only now finally look around and notice things other than being ill.

He walked gingerly across the deck. How clean it looked! He knew they scrubbed it every morning—swabbed, a sailor’s term—and then beat it dry. A ship ought to be a very clean place, with all this industry. Even now, men scurried around, doing important, fascinating things with ropes and pulleys and sails and things. But he’d been below, and the stench there was terrible. In some places, it smelled like a hundred years of filth caked into the very essence of the ship and exuding its smells in the damp, close conditions. He later learned this was not far from true; a ship, especially so long at sea, is a hard place to keep clean; and the _Bonhomme_ was an old beast.

Hutch spotted Huggy, working with some men coiling rope, and waved to the lanky, dark-skinned youth. They were the same age, had grown up together. Huggy’s life really wasn’t fair when you thought about it; but at least he looked all right at the moment. If seasickness hadn’t hit him, it was fair to certain homesickness would. Perhaps it would wait a few more days…

"Boy. Up here." Hutch turned to find the lieutenant, a man named Brown, motioning for him to come nearer, a frown on his face. "You don’t wave at the men. You’re practically an officer." He looked Hutch up and down, scowling.

He was a large, hairy man with a big barrel chest and heavy, wild eyebrows to match his beard. Apparently what he saw met with little in the way of his approval. His brows grew more and more skeptical, one drawing down, another up, until he looked quite strange. Hutch struggled to keep a straight face, afraid he’d give a nervous laugh. He tried to stop noticing the eyebrows.

"You’re a disgrace, young man," said the lieutenant finally. "Not fit for a dinghy, you aren’t. Go down and have the captain’s manservant help you get dressed properly. Come back here in ten minutes, and not a hair out of place, mind!"

"Yes sir," said Hutch, and saluted. He hoped he’d gotten that right, anyway. He ran off to obey.

"Midshipman!"

"Sir?" Hutch stopped and turned back.

The man was giving him a pained frown, his eyebrows doing an offended squiggle, apparently independent from the rest of his face.

"Don’t run."

"Yes sir." Hutch stalked off in a grand manner, trying to pretend he was quite mature and practically a real officer already.

Behind him, he heard a snicker.

"Start that man!" snapped the lieutenant.

Hutch turned in time to see a large man hit Curly quite violently with the starter. It connected with a loud sound, and he jumped about an inch. Several other, older sailors grinned or looked like they were suppressing grins. Hutch had jumped as well, startled.

"Back to work, you mangy dogs!" snapped the large man. "Unless you want a whipping and no grog for a month!"

The men, including the curly-headed guy, all turned back to their tasks as if nothing much had happened.

Hutch swallowed. Little as he liked being mocked by that callow sailor, he was more uneasy of that huge man, who could kick and holler, and treat them like they were all slaves. Was that how they kept discipline onboard a ship?

On his way to obey the lieutenant, he spotted the other midshipman, the proper middy. A tall, severe-looking boy a little older than Hutch, whose name he had been told was Wilbur. He had a deep tan, long, sandy hair pulled back neatly into a sailor’s braid, and a rather superior moustache. He was older and thicker, if no taller, and had a rather nasty, square, squashed face, looking as if he would get pleasure out of kicking around younger boys. But Hutch wasn’t much smaller, and after all, faces could be deceiving.

"How-d-ye-do," said Hutch, smiling politely and offering his hand. Wilbur cast him a look up and down, smirked, and gave him a quick, cold handshake. "Welcome aboard," he said in a tone entirely at odds with his words.

Hutch felt unhappy about that; the one person of his own rank, whom perhaps he could’ve had for a friend and talked to as an equal—perhaps even gotten some help from, learning about the ship—seemed disinclined to any kindness, and Hutch immediately dismissed the idea of asking him for advice or help.

He made it to breakfast, decked out properly to suit lieutenant Brown—and a good thing, too. Captain Marley’s mean, squinty little pig eyes looked at him without an ounce of compassion, and a great deal of what might just be hate. "Hm," he said, cutting into his huge slice of ham with a fierce knife and fork. "Nice of you to see fit to join us, Master Hutchinson." He said the name as though it were poison.

Hutch blinked once and stood stunned.

"Well? Are you going to sit down? We don’t stand on ceremony here," said the acid-tongued captain. Wilbur, already seated, smirked behind his coffee cup.

The surgeon, Bixley, who was tearing apart a biscuit and dipping it in watered-down honey, cast Hutch a glance that seemed to say, "Yes, this is what he’s like—you’d better obey." (Hutch learned later that surgeons did not usually eat with the captain either, but the captain preferred a captive audience for his mealtime grumblings, and insisted on having one.)

Hutch sat down, and spent a miserable breakfast at the growling, grumpy man’s table. He wasn’t yet hungry enough to eat a big meal, which was just as well, since he was not at all used to the way the dishes shifted, the biscuits rolled, and the teacups had to be grabbed and put back into their proper spots.

He looked around at the others; but they all seemed to know what to do without thinking, without even noticing that they were doing it, and managed to eat and drink and concentrate on the conversation all around the terrible task of keeping their things from falling. Hutch was kept quite busy enough simply herding or corralling his breakfast dishes, never mind actually eating the breakfast.

Finally, one of the white rolls took off from his plate and went rolling across the ship. A sudden creak of the ship and slightly steeper than normal tilt, riding over a wave, caused the biscuit to roll and roll, the whole way until it hit the wall. All conversation ceased; the lieutenant and surgeon and captain turned to stare at Hutch, their cheeks bulging like squirrels. Wilbur swallowed the last of his coffee and outright grinned.

"And what!" said the captain, "is the meaning! Of that!" He pointed a dramatic finger at the biscuit, spitting crumbs in his wrath. "You! Wasteful! Brat!" He slammed a ham fist down on the table and glowered at Hutch. "Pick it up! Go on! Throw it away, if you must—you wasteful whore’s son! The sailors would give their eye teeth for such soft bread! Go on, throw it out under their noses, why don’t you! Not good enough for you!" He subsided with a rumbled grumble, and went back to eating, his piggy eyes shooting Hutch an occasional, deeply suspicious glower.

"N-no sir," said Hutch, by now well and truly intimidated. "I’ll eat it. I—I don’t mind." And so he fetched the "wasteful" biscuit and ate it under the captain’s wrathful glare. He dusted it off a little on his sleeve on the way back to his seat; but he didn’t quite dare blow on it, and it tasted of dust.

After that he lost any appetite he had remaining.

He was quite glad a midshipman was not allowed to challenge a superior officer to a duel. He’d probably ought to have done so, if it were allowed. His honor, whatever there was of it, came out feeling distinctly battered.

But he’d rather eat a dusty biscuit any day than try to wound or kill a man.

#

The lieutenant set him some book learning after the disastrous breakfast, but most of all assigned him to talk to a heavy, angry-looking man who would show him the ropes, as it were. Well, Hutch thought it was ‘as it were,’ but no, he literally showed Hutch the ropes, sails, and parts of the ship. It turned out there were a great many of them, and all with their own special names. He found many of the names confusing and difficult to say. They left his head spinning, and he knew he’d never possibly remember them all at first go.

But worst of all, the man seemed determined to hate him. He spoke in a growling, begrudging voice that made him hard to understand. He was a large, powerful man with curly black hair, some of it going white, a real sailor with a great presence—and he was a black man. Dobey, he was called.

Hutch hurried to catch up with him as he moved on to another part of the ship. "Please—what was this one again?" Hutch held up the tied knot Dobey had shown him but a moment ago.

He really hadn’t caught the name. Hutch sometimes had trouble hearing things correctly—a foxhunting incident, years ago, had left him almost permanently deaf in one ear—and the man really was mumbling a lot.

Dobey turned on him with such a withering expression of wrath that Hutch shrank back a step. Then he recollected himself, and held the rope out again. "Please. If you please. I missed the name, sorry."

Dobey took it from him. "A sheet bend. And a child could tie it, if he’d been to sea more than a day!" He undid the rope, and angrily redid the knot. It looked like magic to Hutch, real and proper magic. One moment it was two ropes, the next a fancy knot.

"Now you try." Dobey thrust the ropes into his hands, leaving Hutch to fumble with it for several sweaty-handed minutes, coming up with a feeble excuse of a knot. Worse, instead of instructing or fixing, Dobey just watched.

Quiet footsteps came up behind him, and Hutch heard a low laugh. It almost sounded friendly, and he’d have been glad enough to hear it under other circumstances. But now it was aimed at him; this sailor was laughing at him. He turned with a glower to face—who else?—the curly headed sailor. "If you please, sailor," said Hutch crisply, and thrust the ropes into Curly’s hands.

　

　


	2. Chapter 2

　

Chapter two

　

"Sure, I’ll show ya how it’s done." The northerner with his lazy smile took the ropes and whipped out the knot in two seconds flat. "Or if you’d like to see a sheepbend— _baa-aa!_ —or a clove hitch—" His hands made the knots as fast as he spoke, and then undid them and handed the ropes back, an insolent half-smile on his face.

"Thank you, sailor. That will be all." Hutch snatched the ropes from his hands, his face growing hot. Idiot. He’d been an idiot, giving the boy a chance to show off.

The sailor touched two fingers to his forehead in a little salute, still smiling, eyes sparkling. He turned lazily to head back to his work.

Hutch glared after him, feeling shaken by the good-natured mockery, almost more shaken than he had been by Wilbur’s disdain or the captain’s fury. He was rather used to both of those, living around his father. It didn’t mean he liked them. But…being laughed at. He couldn’t stand been laughed at.

Miss Marie Bella. She’d laughed at him. But then, she was a nasty girl, everyone said so. A nasty, beautiful girl who had severely shaken him with her laughter once when he’d stuttered, asking her to dance at the Richmond’s ball. "You silly boy," she’d said in her gentle twang. It didn’t possibly sound like she could be saying such ugly words with her gentle voice. "I’d rather rot in my grave than dance with the likes of you."

Of course later he found out it was not all entirely him; her father and his had argued over a colt. The two men had had words at a horse auction, and while it had passed over Hutch’s head, it hadn’t passed over Marie Bella’s. Hutch’s father apparently had said some nasty, off-color things.

But then, that was his way. He always seemed to have a feud going with someone. Hutch could bear that with more fortitude, if only people didn’t hold it against him as well—and hold it they did, for he found himself shunned by more people every time his father went on a trip and returned with wrath-filled stories of the people who had wronged him.

Sometimes Hutch was afraid he was a little like his father, because he grew furious when people laughed at him, too. But so far he’d managed to keep it in check….

Now the sailor sauntered away, leaving Hutch filled with wrath and no outlet for it. Dobey showed him more of the ship, and a few more knots, but it did little good. The man mumbled; Hutch could not concentrate on nor remember a fifth of the information the big, angry black man rushed through. After a little while, he was tempted to stop trying.

Not all was terrible, however. The master’s mate and the cook both proved amenable, willing to talk and share information about the ship, her running, and the things Hutch would need to know to remain onboard and do his new job.

The captain was a bit soft on book learning; if Hutch ever hoped to pass for lieutenant, or even just become a decent midshipman, he’d have to study on his own. There were of course the navigation requirements, which the lieutenant would tutor both midshipmen on, and the log he was supposed to keep, and should start any time now.

But even if he were soft on books, the captain would want Hutch to know this ship backwards and forwards, and someone really ought to teach him. If only both men weren’t so busy, they’d certainly have volunteered, indeed.

As it was, he found himself seeking out Huggy and asking for his help. Huggy was willing enough, and a far better teacher, though he was but learning himself. But he only had a few snatched minutes now and then, between his sailor’s duties.

When he could spare the time, both boys sat or stood on the deck out of the way, their heads bent over ropes, fingers pulling knots into place, practicing. Huggy repeated, chanted, or sang the rhymes someone had taken the time to teach him. They really did help Hutch remember better. And they stood close together, heads craning, pointing back and forth to ropes and spars and sails and things, saying the names. Huggy repeated them, when it was noisy, going around to Hutch’s good ear and saying it close and loud, till he could say it back. In this way, he learned more from his best friend than he ever did from the ones who were supposed to teach him.

But ships and ropes were not where his talents lay, and he often went to sleep at night feeling like the stupidest student alive. He knew that, had any of those aboard been under his training, learning about saddles and horses and riding and breeding, these feelings of inadequacy could well have been reversed. Yet knowing that didn’t help, because he was the only one who did know it.

Wilbur despised him, frequently laughed at him, and Hutch fairly often caught the curly-headed boy’s amused looks and raised eyebrows—and then had to try to pretend he didn’t notice or care—and of course he still had the captain’s distain.

But the captain was rarely on the deck, leaving most of his work to Lieutenant Brown. Curly (called Davy Jones by the other sailors), was after all just a regular sailor. And Wilbur left him entirely alone, except for telling him in no uncertain terms just how much of the shared midshipman’s quarters he could use—little, and keep it neat.

Despite everything, little by little, stumblingly and rather against his will, Hutch began to become a sailor. His duties were his book learning (of which there was little assigned), his navigation lessons (of which there were many and all quite confusing), running messages, standing watches (often in the night and miserable they were, too), and of course, learning about the ship.

"All right, boy," said the lieutenant, just when he was beginning to get his sea legs. "Time for you to try the crow’s nest." He jerked his head towards the basket at the top of the tallest mast.

Hutch swallowed, and blanched a little under his tan. "Yes sir." He began the climb. He went very slowly to much suppressed laughter and japes from the crew below, climbing miserably up, slow and crablike, the lubber for all to see, ashamed of his unseamanlike qualities.

"Silence, you men! Bosun!" There was the sound of a blow, and a yelp. "You—Starsky—help him."

Hutch peered back down to see who this Starsky was, and realized he’d climbed a surprisingly short distance.

Oh no. It couldn’t be him—Curly, the one they called Davy Jones. It did little to comfort him, that Curly’s expression held just as much distaste as he felt. This was the fellow he’d be relying on—and displaying his fear and ignorance of shipboard life before?

"Go on—up, you two," said Brown in his sternest voice, both his eyebrows pulling down at once. "The captain will be out in a few moments." He turned and strode from the deck.

And so they went.

Hutch moved slowly and carefully while Starsky bounded up, and then every few footholds had to pause and wait for Hutch. Starsky’s impatience was barely restrained, and Hutch could almost hear him chafing, hear his silent mockery of ‘The Lubber.’

"I think the chickens could climb faster than you," said Starsky in a light, conversational voice.

Hutch sent him a glare. He had to squint up towards the sun to see the sailor’s head, his dark mane lit from behind like a curly halo.

"What gets me," said Starsky, still in that conversational tone of voice, "is how you’re a midshipman, and you couldn’t sail your way out of a puddle."

Hutch was parallel to him now, struggling for every handhold, hesitantly taking each step. He would’ve felt accomplished even to have come this far, if not for the sailor’s sardonic gaze upon him.

Starsky continued. "And me, I’ve been on the sea since I was eleven, and look what it gets me—lower pay than you, and I’m better than you in every way. So really. How did you get onboard? How many strings did you daddy have to pull?"

He waited a moment, and when Hutch, his face grimly set, didn’t answer, he continued.

"They say he has a lot of clout, but still. I mean, you can’t—you really can’t—be a midshipman until you’ve already served at sea for several years. You’re supposed to know how to climb to the crow’s nest, for pity’s sake. But you—look at you. You’re shaking and you’re not even halfway up."

Hutch sent him a glare. _Thanks for that._

Starsky climbed a few feet higher, keeping pace with him easily, hanging on by one hand while his other dangled in the air. "I really want to know. Do rich people just get to do whatever they want, even at sea?"

Hutch bit his lip. On the ground, he might’ve punched Starsky by now—even he had his limits. But up here, he didn’t dare let go. And he could see the boy wasn’t going to let the subject drop.

He sighed. "If you really want to know, it’s a common practice for captains to sign the names of their friends’ sons on with a ship’s company, so everyone can pretend they’ve been at sea since they were young. Then when they’re older, they can become midshipmen without having to start out so young."

Starsky snorted. "So it’s a scam. You’re illegal."

"Yes. If you want to put it that way. It wasn’t my idea." He grimly made it up another two steps and hung there, resting, trying to gain nerve for the rest of the climb. He took deep breaths of the beautiful sea air. If only it gave his heart as much courage as it gave oxygen to his lungs. He paused to glare at Starsky again. "And lots of people do it. Not just my dad and your captain." _Even though they both are disreputable men…_

Starsky’s face turned cold, cold and deadly as the Maine Sea. His eyes were a chilly mixture of blue and gray. "I suppose that’s what you tell yourself about owning a slave, too."

Hutch stopped climbing, and turned to look at him. Starsky’s gaze was cold indeed, and sarcastic, bitter and angry. He kept one arm hooked through the ropes, and crossed it with his other one. Standing like that, he looked like some kind of ragged, implacable sea god. Neptune, Hutch decided. A curly-haired, disreputable Neptune.

Hutch wanted to defend himself, he wanted to say it was none of Starsky’s business (but slavery was, surely, everyone’s business). He wanted to protest his innocent in the whole debacle. He wanted to say that Huggy loved him and he’d never let him be mistreated. But that didn’t matter; the truth was, Huggy was a slave. And that wasn’t fair, no matter how you looked at it.

He took a deep breath. "I admit, it’s not right. I don’t agree with slavery, and I plan to set Huggy free as soon as I’m old enough." Curly opened his mouth sarcastically to protest. Hutch sent him a glare and didn’t let him interrupt. "If I tried now, he’d legally go back to my father, and I can’t let that happen. I’m not old enough. And you don’t know anything about it, so keep your mouth shut."

His own mouth grimly set, he began his shaky climb again.

"Who says I don’t?" Starsky bounded up, keeping pace with him easily, sending Hutch a mean glare. "You’re the one that doesn’t know. My sea-daddy, Dobey, told me all about when he used to be a slave—except some things he said are too terrible to talk about! Yeah, there’s some stuff he won’t even tell me, and we tell each other everything." He glared at Hutch, eyes burning, and jutted his finger at Hutch. "And you’re a part of that. You’re a coward. Nobody deserves to own another human being. I hate you."

Hutch’s lip curled in sardonic rage. "Your argument has grown so deep. _Ad hominem_ attacks, anyone?"

"I don’t know what those words mean! Don’t you dare—"

"Oh, and I suppose nobody has ‘dared’ wave my ignorance in my face? It’s been nothing else, since I’ve been here!"

"Ignorance! I’ll have you know…!"

"That you know nothing?" Hutch turned and sneered at the other boy. "That you’re a worthless sea monkey, who might as well be a slave himself? I see the way you’re treated. Kicked around, yelled at, constantly at someone else’s beck and call. You only get to sleep in shifts, you’re out in all weather…"

Starsky drew back with an enraged expression. "Shows what you know! The sailor’s life’s a great one! And I can leave anytime I want! Jump ship and…just take off!" He raised a hand and sent it shooting out, like a frog jumping away.

Hutch watched his hand travel through the air. At the reminder of how high they were, Hutch blanched, and clung tighter at the ropes.

Seeing it, Starsky sneered. "And you. You’re such a baby you can’t even climb to the crow’s nest. What do you know about being a sailor? Nothing, that’s what! You don’t know nothing!"

"MEN! GET DOWN HERE."

Both boys looked down to see the captain glowering up at them, dangerously red-faced. And then they noticed the rest of the crew was standing around, watching or pretending to work and trying not to look as if they were watching.

Starsky and Hutch exchanged looks; the dark-haired boy looked distinctly scared.

"I don’t suppose they heard us down below," said Hutch in a whisper.

"Oh hell." Starsky headed down, taking his arm to help him at one point. They got down faster than they’d gotten up. Hutch found his feet were less unwilling to head down.

Starsky jumped the last few feet and landed on the deck, pulling his shirt into place and quickly and nervously moving to stand in front of the captain at attention. Hutch joined him, in line, unsure what to expect. But Starsky’s radiating nerves were definitely catching.

"Just what! Did you think! You were doing!" thundered the captain in a wheezing voice. "You!" He shoved a finger towards Curly’s face. "Thirty lashes and bread and water for thirty days! Don’t you dare! Ever! Talk back! To a superior!"

Starsky stood rigidly. "Yes sir!" He saluted sharply, eyes straight ahead.

"GO!" He pointed a thundering finger towards the middeck. Starsky shot off.

"And you! In my cabin!" thundered the captain.

Hutch fled before the awfulness of his wrath.

　

　

　

　


	3. Chapter 3

　

Chapter three

　

　

He didn’t get a beating; not an official one, anyway.

The captain spent ages just reaming him out, yelling and wheezing about the dignities of command and, whatever the proper response would have been (this he did not say), it was most definitely NOT to argue with a common sailor, in the hearing of all, as if he were a common fishwife! You were to use dignity, rule of law, and altogether behave like a gentleman. This, mind you, while he was shouting and pacing.

He sat down finally, looking tired, and then jumped up to slap Hutch in the face. Hutch, startled, jerked a little and blinked at him.

"Show some respect!" the captain snapped.

"Sir. Yes sir," said Hutch, his jaw ringing. He held still, resisting the urge to rub his jaw.

The captain glowered at him with red-rimmed eyes. "What would your father say, young man!?!"

"I don’t know, sir." He kept his eyes down, hands at his sides, feeling humiliated. But, he’d been through worse with his own father. It was rather easier to take from a stranger. Because, he realized, he didn’t actually care what the captain thought of him. Captain Marley had shown often enough by now that he despised Hutch; and Hutch didn’t really care if he did or not. It would, of course, have been convenient had he not, but that was nothing he expected now.

"He would say he was ashamed! He would say you’re a pox upon his family name and a regular bastard!"

He’d been called worse. It went down to join a fierce little ball of hurt and anger in his gut. But he ignored it.

"Look at me when I’m speaking to you, boy!" The captain reached out and boxed Hutch on the side of his head. The blow rang explosions in his brain, through his ear and into the rest of him.

Captain Marley cursed Ken, calling him seven kinds of names, but they barely registered. Hutch held the side of his face, bending forward. The captain grabbed his shoulders and shook him. The next little while was a blur; but Hutch finally found himself thrown to the floor. He curled on the corner, holding the side of his face, trying to make himself as small as possible.

The captain kicked at him once, and then stormed from the room. The door slammed. Hutch laid curled small, holding his head, feeling the fireworks, squeezing his eyes shut. How had it gone so wrong? The captain must really hate him, to kick him. If only he hadn’t hit his ear. His good ear. It was still ringing. He felt wetness there, and drew his hand back and looked. Blood. Just an outer wound, surely. Not permanent damage, no, no…

He got up, and wiped his nose, and cleaned up the blood as best he could with his handkerchief, and tried to leave the room with his shoulders back and his head held high, acting like a midshipman should.

The beating was going on outside; Curly had been stripped bare to the waist and bent forward. He jerked with each lash of the whip. Hutch jerked a little, too, and hurried past.

The captain hadn’t given him any punishments; nothing but his hitting and yelling. Hutch made his way downstairs, to the rhythmic sounds of Starsky’s beating.

#

His ear didn’t quit bleeding. He kept a cloth under it that night, and in the morning went to see the surgeon. Starsky was there in the sickbay, lying on his chest, his back bare but for bandages. Hutch winced when he saw the damage. He didn’t know what to say.

"May I speak to you for a moment, sir?" He addressed the surgeon, deciding to ignore Starsky.

"Yes? What is it?" The doctor looked up from rolling bandages, and then went back to them.

Hutch followed him. "It’s my ear, sir. Could you please look at it?"

"Your deaf one?"

"No sir. The other one."

The doctor looked up. "What seems to be the problem?"

"It keeps bleeding, sir. And…sort of ringing."

After that the doctor looked at him, checked him over, tutted a little, poked at his ear, and gave him an oily dressing and bandages. His hands were gentle, and Hutch felt himself relaxing under the touch, even with the no-doubt furious Curly in the room, probably judging him for being a baby.

He glanced over, and saw the boy’s eyes watching him, skeptically.

The surgeon followed Hutch from the room and pressed a small bottle of laudanum into his hands. "A few drops before bed, to help you sleep. Don’t use much."

"Is he going to be all right, sir?" asked Hutch quietly.

"Who? Davy? Of course. This isn’t his first whipping and it won’t be his last. I’ll look after him. You look after that ear." And then he turned back inside.

The next few days were difficult. The crew seemed tense, and they looked at Hutch every time he was nearby. It was enough to make a body feel self-conscious. He had the feeling they were talking about him, whispering and passing around the argument with Davy, but at the same time, he didn’t really want to know. He certainly couldn’t ask poor Huggy, who was unfairly caught in the middle on this one.

The captain ignored him at the table, when he ate, and saw him little else. He seemed to have given Hutch up for a lost cause, but at least he was not hitting or yelling now.

And as for Hutch’s ear, it continued to plague him. He took the drops at night, could not have gotten to sleep without them, but during the day, the pain flagged him, carried around in his head, a throbbing, and now a heat and swelling; and then, finally, a loss of hearing.

He noticed, when he did not waken with the bells one day, that everything seemed a bit dim, as though set at a distance. His head ached and throbbed, and he did not give it much thought, until he missed two direct commands. The first was from Wilbur, who ordered him to put out the light and go to bed. He came over and smacked Ken’s face, and pushed him back, rolling him over on his bunk and blew out the light, leaving a startled Ken to wonder what he’d done, and close his book in the dark. Only later did he realize he hadn’t heard Wilbur’s words. It was the only explanation that made sense for Wilbur’s attitude of injured, justified wrath.

They had to shake him awake for his watch in the middle of the night, and he barely heard the reaming out he got from the lieutenant, a great stickler for promptness and the need for middies to self-regulate and act like men.

He nodded and nodded, not daring to speak, afraid to let on he could barely distinguish one word in three. He kept his eyes on the lieutenant’s mouth, watching the words, making sense of most of them this way.

On the deck, even wrapped in his bad-weather gear, the blow was terrible. It was his first watch in a storm. He stared about the deck, trying to keep a close watch on everything. There was a low noise where he knew there should’ve been a great one from the pounding waves and the wind. It was not, he knew, a bad storm. There had barely been any battening down, and what he’d caught of the conversation earlier told him it was a light blow, nothing more.

But to him, it could not have been worse. He’d never seen a storm at sea first hand, and he stayed wide-eyed and alert, watching the men go about their tasks, hoping nothing would go wrong where he would need to waken the lieutenant, or worse, the captain.

His ear still throbbed and burned, and he found it took all his strength and stamina to remain upright. He paused several times, leaning against part of the ship’s stout wood to keep himself upright. He rested his arms around a beam, and closed his eyes, for one moment.

Sleep called to him, that dark and painless place. He blinked awake and drew back nervously, and went back to staring around the heaving, terrible deck, feeling the queasiness in his stomach, the water lashing against his face and drenching him despite his rain slicks, and the burning, terrible burning in his ear.

Someone touched his shoulder, and he jumped a fathom. He whirled around to see who had tried to scare him, and found the lieutenant talking to him. He couldn’t hear him, not one word over the storm. Even though he could see the lieutenant’s mouth opening wide in almost a shout as he gestured towards down below, for one wild moment, he thought, _I’m deaf. I can’t hear anything_. And then, _No, it’s the storm—that’s all._

Brown must have seen from his blank face that he was missing something. He shouted one more word, clearly visible on his mouth—BED—and pushed Hutch stumbling towards down below.

He spent the rest of the night in pain, even after drying off. He took the laudanum drops, but even so lay clutching the side of his head, sobbing in pain. He was too far gone to fetch the surgeon; he was too far gone to move. And he lay like that, until the huge, heating, swelling pain throbbed to bursting point. Something popped in his ear, and then there was just blessed relief, and warm liquid flooding, and he took more laudanum and drank away his consciousness, and slept in the blessed, pure, pain-free utter silence.

#

Going deaf was in some ways quite comfortable. People stopped expecting so much from him. No one yelled at him now; or if they did, he missed it. It encased him in a curious silence, like a protective shell. He’d become a turtle. He could move quietly and slowly around and no one bothered him at all now.

Wilbur was sent to waken him the next morning, but when he did not respond, the midshipman shoved him. Hutch still heavily drugged, rolled aside and didn’t waken, but Wilbur had seen the blood and pus on his pillow and been frightened enough to fetch the surgeon.

Then he was carried to the infirmary and laid in a bed, and the doctor poked at and physic’d him until he awoke, and then tried to get some response from him at noise.

But he could not understand one word in three, even just reading lips. The surgeon’s words were too complicated and not precise enough, and he realized he did not know the form of many words, after all.

He’d begun to rely on looking at mouths to follow what was said long ago, after he went deaf in the one ear. But he was not good enough to read what was said all the time, and so sat encased in his curious, safe silence.

The doctor soon gave up, clasped a hand on Hutch’s knee, and let him go back to sleep.

He slept through the worst of the pain with fevered, drugged dreams where he was so often riding his father’s prize horse again as it tripped, leg caught in the gopher hole, and fell, and he was going down. Again and again, he relived Father’s anger--shooting the horse with its broken leg, and banishing Hutch with a wrath like he’d never known, too furious even to strike him or look at him: simply as if Hutch were no longer his son. And, truth be told, Hutch had been so frightened by the thought of that glacial fury thawing to a white-hot, deadly blaze that he had been glad enough to go.

Huggy came to see him sometimes, but he was obviously disconcerted that he couldn’t communicate with Ken; although he certainly tried. Hutch just patted his hand and shook his head and told him (hoping he spoke clearly, as he could not even hear his own words), "Don’t try. Don’t try, Hug. I can’t hear you. Don’t worry. Maybe I’ll get better."

Maybe he would. The doctor tried to convince him of the possibility, writing it out on paper like a prescription. But he could no more hide his worried and doubtful looks than he could get Hutch to hear again.

Hutch slept for the better part of two days, and when he was well enough to get up and about, he found he had become the ship’s ghost.

It was obvious the captain and lieutenant were both deeply unhappy with the situation, and the captain probably afraid of what Hutch’s father’s reaction would be, but there was little they could do.

They could, and did, cut him adrift from his duties. A deaf man could not keep watch without endangering the crew. Nor could he learn properly about navigation techniques with the other midshipman when he could not even read lips. He could, however, read as many books as he wanted, and wander around the ship, and keep his log. He was also assigned the welcome and nominal duty of assisting the surgeon.

The surgeon taught him carefully several things he could do, and then made lists out for him, and answered Hutch’s occasional questions through writing.

Hutch was not even forced to eat at the captain’s table any longer, but instead got to eat with the lower ranked men, the purser and the cook and bosun, etc. These mostly huge, fierce-looking men were a gentle lot, though, and treated him well. He was allowed to read at the table if he pleased, and never scolded. They fed him generously, and treated him gently, smiling at him and nodding broadly when he drew a picture, giving him thumbs’ up and obviously speaking loud words of praise, which he could not hear.

He was allowed to sit on deck in the nice weather, sit in the corner and read or draw. He wrote in his journal. He helped Jemmy Ducks (the official, not given name of the man assigned to care for the animals) with the feeding and care of the goats and chickens.

He missed animals so much sometimes that their presence was very welcome, and he would even pet the goats, or, when no one was watching, stoop to pick up and hug a chicken, and stroke its feathers. They were silly, flighty, indignant creatures no matter whether you could hear them or not, but they were tame enough they did relish a bit of affection now and then.

He caught Curly at it one day, while walking to the animal pens to pet a chicken. He rounded a corner and came upon Curly with a hen in his arms, bent over it, stroking its feathered back and obviously crooning quiet words to it.

Hutch grinned and stood back, hiding to watch the sailor at his play. He seemed a gentle soul, now, not the fierce-eyed, furious Neptune of the ropes. Hutch had not seen much of him since everything that happened, and he was pleased to see the sailor seemed fully recovered, well-muscled, strong, and without pain or permanent injury.

He stood watching, and then quietly went over and joined him.

Starsky jumped, and glared at him guiltily, setting down the chicken and brushing off his shirt with an air of offended dignity. Hutch smiled at him, picked up a chicken himself, and sat down to hug it. _Maybe it’s silly—but I like to, too._

He turned away from Starsky, ignoring him, and just petting the chicken. He missed horses so deeply. He’d never have thought he could feel anything for a chicken. But this red one had become his favorite, and he’d grown quite fond of most of the others, as well. The very fact he could now tell them apart spoke volumes to the change. Before, a chicken had just been a chicken to him.

After a moment, he turned around to see the boy crouched on the ground, feeding one of the white-and-black spotted ones from his hand, and stroking its feathers every once in a while. Perhaps this was why they’d seemed so tame; he’d already been at the process of making them into pets.

Curly was talking, and every once in a while he looked up, wearing a conversational expression. Hutch realized, with a start, _He’s talking to me!_ No one had talked to him, not properly, since he’d gone deaf. What was the use?

But this boy was talking up a storm, obviously all aimed at him. His face looked earnest and thoughtful, as if he were discussing something that mattered to him deeply. His words were obviously quiet, and he stroked the hen while he talked, but his eyes were on Hutch. Ken smiled at him, and gave a tiny incline of his head. All right. If someone needed the perfect person to keep his secrets, who better than a deaf person? And so he sat down, and ‘listened’ to Starsky’s secrets, hugging his hen and watching Curly’s face.

　

　


	4. Chapter 4

　

Chapter four

　

The worst thing about being deaf was not being able to communicate with Huggy. Everyone else, even Curly, he could write notes to, and they could write notes to him. But Huggy, as a slave, was not allowed to learn to read. Oh, Hutch had tried to teach him when he was younger—and for that, Huggy had been whipped brutally, and Hutch had been belted so long and hard he couldn’t sit down for two days.

For him, not hearing was almost a pleasant break. It allowed him to retreat. No more yelling, no more unfamiliar ship noises. No more high expectations and railing captains ruining his appetite. If he was to be thrown away by his father from his old life, then this was no worse than the life of a proper midshipman—of which it had already begun to seem abundantly clear he would not be one, even before the rest of his hearing went away.

He didn’t realize how hard Huggy was taking all of this, though, until the day he and Starsky were ‘talking’ in the animal pen, and Huggy wandered up, carrying a bucket of scraps from the kitchen. At the sight of Starsky, he seemed to bristle up like an indignant porcupine, and jabbed a hate-filled gaze at Starsky. He pointed one accusing finger, and said something, but his words were quick and his mouth not directly facing Hutch, so he couldn’t tell what they were.

Starsky rose, awkward-looking, and dusted off his shirt and pants.

Hutch stepped forward, reached for Huggy, and slipped a hand round his neck. He looked at him, in the face, and gave him a little smile, a little shake, and then reached over and dragged Dave nearer, holding him by the arm, then the back of the neck. He’d never really touched the boy on purpose before, but it seemed the opportune time. He gave them both a light shake, and smiled purposefully at Huggy, until the darker-skinned boy frowned, and nodded.

All right. I won’t stay mad at him.

Hutch grinned at Huggy, and said, aloud (or he hoped he said aloud; he couldn’t hear), "Thanks, Hug."

Curly looked at him quickly, apparently startled by the fact that he’d spoken. They both said something, but Ken just shook his head.

"I can’t hear you, and you’re talking too fast, I can’t see your words. But I can still talk, you know. My mouth isn’t broken."

After that, Huggy crowded closer, speaking slowly and distinctly, several words, facing Hutch quite close, and using his hands to mime and gesture. Hutch kept guessing, until Huggy nodded, and they developed a rudimentary conversation between them.

Starsky disappeared somewhere, and returned with a scrap of paper. Then they developed a three way conversation between them, with Huggy telling Dave what to write, and he scratching it down in awkward, poorly-spelled words. Ken read it, and spoke his reply aloud. They kept this up for nearly a half hour, until someone came to fetch Huggy, and tell him he was wanted in the kitchen.

Hutch gave him a quick goodbye embrace, and watched him go. It made him sad to realize just how much Huggy had been worried about him. His first question, and the one that seemed to concern him the most, was whether Hutch was in pain.

Now, he turned to look at Dave again. The curly sailor looked a lot less confident than he usually did during their ‘talks.’ He twirled the pencil in one hand, and scuffed the paper in his other. Hutch glanced down at it, and then back at him, and raised his eyebrows.

Starsky frowned a little, and then sat down and began to write in his blocky letters. IM SORY I GOT U IN TRUBLE.

Hutch shrugged. "Maybe I got you in trouble. Why blame yourself? We didn’t know we could be heard down below."

Starsky nodded quickly, and bent to write again. YES BUT I SHUD HAV NOWN. I AM A SALOR, I HAV EXPERENC, AND YOU DON’T. YOU NO NOTHING, I NO MOST THINGS. I SHUD HAVE DUN BETER. THEN THE CAPTAIN WUDNT HAV HIT U. SORRY YOU WENT DEF.

"I said it wasn’t your fault. Forget it."

Hutch took the paper from him, and began to correct all his spelling errors. He handed it back.

Starsky looked down at it in consternation, and then back at Hutch. He shook his head, and tried to hand it back.

Hutch shoved it back at him, and poked at the paper. "Learn something. Learn to spell, if you don’t want people to think you’re ignorant."

Starsky made a face, but he accepted the paper finally, and folded it small into his pocket. "Goodbye," he said clearly, facing Hutch.

Hutch nodded. "Goodbye. See you later," he added.

Starsky nodded and wandered away, frowning a bit.

Hutch watched him go, wondering if Starsky hadn’t liked him better when he couldn’t respond (and correct spelling).

#

They reached England. The shores brought shore leave for most of the men. Huggy, as a slave, wasn’t allowed any; England’s shores held freedom for him, and he was left under the guard of the men watching the ship so he wouldn’t run away.

Hutch faked being sick and stayed on the ship, too. And when the time came, he gave Huggy a small bag with all of his money he had, and hugged him goodbye, and went to distract the guards.

He began going over to the ropes and investigating things they would much rather he left alone, leaving the men, loathe to be unkind to a deaf boy, to follow him around nervously. He kept it up until he was certain Huggy had had time to slip over the side. Huggy had learned to swim long ago, when Hutch had. That was one thing he could teach his friend without getting him in trouble. And now it was the key to his freedom, and Hutch would never see him again…

As soon as he safely could, he escaped to his cabin so no one would see him cry.

When Huggy was discovered to be gone, nothing could be done; they couldn’t search the city, looking for one runaway slave. Hutch, moneyless and mourning the loss of his best friend, stayed on the ship for the rest of the leave. He didn’t see much of anyone—most sailors still had leave, and were making the most of it—and he hid in his room and wrote and read and yes, sometimes, cried.

When they left port the sailors’ eyes were red-rimmed, their pockets emptied. Hung-over, broke, and some sporting venereal diseases or new bar fight injuries, they seemed contented and exhausted, partly relieved to be back on their floating home, partly regretful their days of rabblerousing had ended—till the next time in port.

When Hutch saw Starsky for the first time, the curly-headed boy looked entirely disreputable, half asleep and completely worn out. He also looked rather content and cocky.

Hutch couldn’t hear them, but when they set sail and were under way, he knew the sailors were talking amongst themselves about Huggy’s escape, and the convenient fact that he’d escaped from right under Hutch’s nose.

Hutch ignored the talk and the glances. Since he couldn’t hear, people seemed to believe he was stupid, and his feigned ignorance allowed him to see more than they realized.

He noticed Starsky’s shocked glance in his direction when Curly first heard. They didn’t talk about it; but from that one, shocked glance—he knew Curly knew.

Without Huggy around—his constant companion practically since birth—Hutch felt lonelier than ever. Not only was he still locked in the curious silence, he was now without even his best friend.

But after that, things changed between him and Starsky. Curly seemed to sense his depression, and took him under his wing.

Starsky began finding Hutch when he had a free moment, and dragging him off by the sleeve, showing him around the ship. He pointed to certain sails and wrote down their names (or more probably, poorly spelled versions of their names). If there were to be teaching roles, he seemed to think, they should be equal. So Hutch ended up learning more about the mizzenmast, and the mainsail, and the poop deck and all the other things he’d thought he’d gotten away from learning.

Once, Curly brought him down to the stores and showed him the bilge, and the horrible, rotting-smelling parts of the ship, where rats bounced away when Curly held up a light, and he kicked them away if they did not run fast enough.

"Why doesn’t someone kill them?" said Hutch, raising his voice, shrinking a little nearer Starsky without meaning to.

Starsky sent him an amused look. He didn’t have a pencil and paper today, nor could he have written anywhere had he. He looked at Hutch and replied, making his words slow and carefully formed. Hutch watched, and tried to distinguish what he said. "We do. They breed too fast."

"Breed too fast?" said Hutch. Starsky nodded and gave him a little poke in the arm, looking pleased with him.

"Well, what do you want to show me? I want to go back up."

Starsky just took his arm and tugged him after him, down the damp, terrible-smelling corridor. Rats jumped away—Hutch could almost hear them squeaking in his head, the way his brain sometimes supplied the missing sounds, or he’d wake up with snatches of remembered music in his head.

Curly led him past another large support beam, and hesitated. Hutch realized he was counting spaces on the wall. He moved down five thick boards, and then pushed the lantern into Hutch’s hand and motioned for him to stand back. Curly bent in front of it and began digging at it with his pocket-knife, and tugging. Hutch watched in fascination. Water dripped on his head; he moved aside a little, and held the lantern up higher, supporting his flagging right arm with his left hand.

At last, the wooden panel came free. Starsky pulled it back and turned to grin at him. His smile was very bright in the dark, his teeth lit by the lantern light.

He motioned Hutch closer, and pointed. Hutch peered inside, but he saw nothing. Just a small, dirty hideaway—and an empty one at that. Grinning again, Curly moved forward. He squeezed himself sideways through the slim space and edged in, until he was exactly fitted into the spot. He stood wedged in there, a bright-eyed, curly-haired boy, disreputable-looking in his shirt that was open to his chest, and his eyes that gleamed in the lantern light, like a little hidden Starsky-prize: a jewel of some kind. He looked up, and poked his fingers into the thick spaces between the boards over head, and nodded at Hutch, and motioned for him to close up the panel.

Hutch obeyed, popping it back into place. He waited a moment, then nervously began to dig at the panel again with his fingernails, afraid he’d trapped Starsky for good.

"Starsky. Starsk! Come out!"

He panicked, digging harder with one hand, his other one holding the lantern high. He breath run ragged in his throat, shaky breaths in the foul air. The rats surrounded, and he knew they squeaked—one barreled against his leg and he yelped and kicked it away.

Suddenly, the board was pushed out, and like an explosion, the sailor boy emerged. He took the lantern from Hutch, smiling at him, and patted his cheek with his free hand.

Hutch slugged him on the arm, hard. Starsky opened his mouth and laughed. He pointed to the little hole and then Hutch, but Hutch backed away, shaking his head, and wouldn’t go in.

At last Starsky shrugged and closed it up again, and led the way back upstairs, Hutch sticking close and looking all around nervously at the rats.

　

　

　


	5. Chapter 5

　

Chapter five

　

　

One day, Hutch was minding his own business, practicing the rope knots Starsky had taught him. Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed quick movement and looked up. People were running, quite in a state. A number of sailors clustered at the edge of the ship, peering over the rail, shouting and gesturing. Someone threw a rope, drew it back, threw again.

There was desperation in the air. He didn’t have to be able to hear to know that.

Someone had fallen overboard, hadn’t they? But no, that couldn’t be the case. No one was turning the ship around, no one was swimming out to fetch whoever it was.

He put his ropes down and hurried to join the crowd, slipping between the hulking sailor and the shorter, bow-legged ones, elbowing people aside until finally he had a place at the rail. He was jostled; he was aware they were shouting, but he was still encased in that curious silence.

What he saw made his blood run cold. Curly flailed in the water, far out and very pale, bedraggled as a rat and not floating half so well as a rat would’ve done.

Hutch glanced at the men; their faces were grim. He glanced at the captain, walking the deck with a steady tread; his face was set, and he moved not an inch to rescue the fallen sailor.

It took not a second’s thought. Hutch stripped off his shirt, kicked off his shoes. He grabbed the end of a long rope, tied it quickly around his waist, shoved the rest into Dobey’s hands, climbed up, and dove.

He cut into the cold, salty water like a knife. Deep, deep he went and then swam towards the surface. He’d never swum in the sea before, but it was not so different from a lake, just saltier and wilder. He swam to Starsky and caught him by the shirt.

Curly was nearly drowned by now, so he had not the strength to fight as a drowning man usually would. This made Hutch’s job easier. He tugged on the rope and they heaved him back with a vengeance, back to the _Bonhomme_ , back hauling the limp Starsky with him.

There was a bosun’s swing to carry them up, and many hands indeed to haul them onto the deck, to lay Starsky out and thump on his chest.

No response.

Flushed, anxious faces regarded the sailor, laid out flat like a fish. Hutch pushed aside the offer of a towel and padded over on the sun-warmed wooden deck. He knelt and was about to add his thumpings to the doctoring.

The surgeon pushed his way through and gestured to the men. Someone rolled over a barrel and they tossed Starsky over it, face down to let him drain. With this, and the doctor tending him, Starsky was conscious again in minutes, although he had gone very pale and his lips were blue.

The men set up a cheer, quite visible even to a deaf man, and there was much smiling and backslapping for Hutch, some of it almost enthusiastic enough to knock the youth of sixteen to his knees.

A shadow fell. Silence, too. Hutch saw the mouths close, the animation die off each man’s happy face and an expression of either blankness or foreboding replace it. He almost didn’t have to look up to know. The captain was there, terrible in his wrath.

He towered, red-faced, yelling, pointing. The words were an enigma, the message clear enough. Hutch had broken orders, and if he thought he was getting away with it just because he couldn’t hear, he was absolutely wrong.

The next few minutes Hutch would’ve preferred to forget. But a captain’s power onboard his ship was absolute: life and death over his men, and no court would hold sway against him. The hands that had moments ago helped Hutch aboard and shaken him in enthusiastic praise were now the hands stretching him out for his whipping. He was already stripped to the waist, as if pre-prepared.

It was worse than he possibly could’ve imagined, each lash hurting anew before the old hurt could die away, compounding and screaming pain into his body until he lost count, until he was certain he could not endure another moment.

But something in him refused to let the captain win. And where he might not have gotten so angry on his own behalf, he felt a pure, cold rage on Starsky’s. That captain would’ve let him die, would he? Hutch did not, dare not scream. He clung to consciousness only by the skin of his teeth, and the grace of God.

He had no idea how many lashes he received; he was past that, and could not hear them counting anyway. They could have gone on forever; perhaps they did.

But no. Now he was loosed, he staggered away dripping gore, slick on the wet deck, barely able to keep his feet beneath him. The ship’s steady, comfortable roll was too much for him. Hands turned gentle helped him below deck, and the doctor tended him with a tight, grim mouth. He gave Hutch laudanum, and, blessedly, he slept.

The next few days were a blur. He slept a great deal, numbed by the drug. The doctor gave it to him whenever he awoke.

When he finally came to feeling like himself, the worst of the pain was gone. His back felt very tender and ached, but the doctor had cleaned and cared for his wounds as best he could; no infection had set in. There might be scars, but no permanent damage.

Yet he could not walk about as he pleased just yet. The doctor made him to understand this all with the written word, but he made it clearer yet with the grim, silent shake of his head, and the hand on Hutch’s arm when he began to get up, eager to go above decks and see the sun. The doctor pointed back to the bed, and Hutch lay down again, not understanding, but trusting him enough not to argue.

The doctor carefully re-bandaged his back once again, and set out more ointment and laudanum, as if he would need them again, very soon.

But within another two days he could not hide how much improved was Hutch’s condition, and the doctor reluctantly allowed him above.

Hutch found the atmosphere much changed, the captain purple-faced and shouting, strutting, giving orders, pointing fingers. The men moved with sullen, slow intent, doing only enough to keep from openly mutinying. Instead of rushing, competent hands and feet and men happy in their work, Hutch saw a changed ship.

Even what activity there was seemed to pause, when he appeared, like a great storm pausing to gather breath. The captain turned at the sight of him, and his face twisted. He said something sarcastic and unkind. It was impossible to tell exactly what with his mouth twisting like that. Hutch found himself straightening, and a cold stiffness overtaking his face. The captain was wrong and he knew it, or he wouldn’t shout so at a man who couldn’t hear him!

The doctor took Hutch’s elbow and steered him away for a walk on the other side of the ship, taking exercise.

Here, encased in his silence, Hutch began to cheer up again. He watched dolphins playing in the wake, and several seagulls swooping and no doubt calling. No one had ever explained to him why seagulls followed ships, but he knew it meant they weren’t far from land. He turned his face skyward, and let the sunlight fall on him, eyes slitting in a feeling of sheer bliss.

Out here, it didn’t matter that he couldn’t hear. The sea reverberated inside him, its sounds beating in his chest, remembered and in the rhythm of the ship, the beauty of the gulls’ wings. And the air tasted so sweet and clean, like the most beautiful drink in the world.

He could not stay upset for any reason, standing here so.

#

The doctor pulled him below again before long, but now he was allowed out every day.

Even with the doctor’s mollycoddling, he was soon fit for duty, which he found much changed.

He had apparently been busted to common sailor in his absence. The duties, which would have been far too difficult for him had he been assigned them at first, were made easier by what he’d learned in the past weeks, and the fact that he was helped, constantly if secretly, by the men. Dobey took an especial interest in protecting him, shielding him from too much heavy hauling or lifting or overwork, so that no matter what duty the captain assigned for him—and this was difficult, relying on clumsy signs and clumsier words translated by Hutch’s immediate superiors—he always seemed to have a large black shadow by his side protecting him, and over a dozen big brothers looking out for him.

But through it all, no Starsky.

The doctor had been vague indeed whenever he’d asked about the sailor. He’d given no answer or excuse for why he hadn’t visited. Of course he was well, he must be, Hutch had seen him come back to life again, given up by the water.

But when he insisted on an answer about Starsky’s whereabouts, the surgeon simply turned his back on him and went back to measuring and weighing medicines, a task from which he was on no account to be disturbed. Hutch felt more frustrated than ever.

By now he was beginning to feel downright hurt. You would think the boy could spare at least a moment or two to—well, not to thank him, precisely, but…well, just to see him, at least. The only thing Hutch could think of was that the boy had been assigned to other duties, to another shift, and simply hadn’t had the time to see him yet.

But he got another impression, from the way the men acted. They averted their eyes from him in private moments on deck, in the quiet below deck where men strung their hammocks out and prepared for sleep, and at the meal when they ate hardtack, banging it first to get out the weevils (although some men preferred to eat the weevils for extra protein). They all averted their eyes the same way the doctor had done.

Hutch began to feel not just indignant and sullen, but afraid. Finally, trying to school his fear, he tugged Dobey aside, trying very hard not to let his mouth tremble. "Did he die after all?" he asked, in the quietest voice he could manage, hoping it was low enough, since he could not gauge its volume with his ears.

Dobey looked at him for a moment, looking as if he struggled with some decision. Hutch bit his lip, hoping, hoping—

At last, Dobey shook his head, and motioned for Hutch to follow him.

Deep into the hold they went. Hutch had never been to this part of the ship before. He began to see why. It smelled terrible, worse than the hold. It was the jail.

Two thin, hairy arms stuck out of the bars of a filthy, thick, terrible-looking door with only a small window in it.

Hutch had to bite his lip to keep from making a sound. He recognized those arms and hands. He reached forward, touched the fingers.

Starsky jerked, and withdrew like a startled octopus. But a moment later he was back, sticking both arms out, and clinging to Hutch’s, patting his hands, grabbing him by the wrists, tugging him closer.

It was a difficult conversation, with no speech possible to be heard on the one hand from Starsky and no sight to be seen of Starsky’s face in the great darkness of the gaol. But somehow they managed to make certain things clear. Hutch was all right; Starsky _would_ be all right, although he certainly could’ve used a bit more to eat.

Hutch’s gaze sought Dobey; the black man nodded grimly. They must be keeping Starsky on bread and water. Hutch patted his hand, and promised to get him more to eat. But Dobey drew him aside then, and, by shaking his head and miming and the careful, silent shapes of words, managed to make clear that whoever fed the boy would be beaten, and then locked up as well. And so Starsky would have to remain on a starvation diet until such time as the captain rescinded his order.

His hands motioned Hutch nearer again, and he waved them in the air, as if belittling his own plea for more food. He tugged Hutch closer again, shook his hand thank-you, and gestured to show that he was fine, just fine.

It made Hutch feel like crying, feeling those dirty, thin hands, once so strong. He patted Starsky awkwardly and withdrew. Dobey led him away. Hutch now understood more of the sullen fury of the crew.

Since he now knew Starsky’s predicament, there was no reason to hide it from him. Someone finally wrote it out for him, and then burned the scrap of paper in the cook stove. The tale ran thus: Starsky had been disrespectful to the captain, trying to interfere in Hutch’s beating, even though he had barely begun to recover from his drowning.

The captain had ordered Starsky thrown into the brig, and Hutch’s beating had continued without abatement. And Hutch, because he could not hear, had never known someone stuck up for him.

　

　

　


	6. Chapter 6

　

　

Chapter six

　

　

The captain began to spend more time in his cabin, to allow the lieutenant to take charge more frequently. When the captain appeared, he often had red-rimmed eyes, and looked as if he had not gotten much rest. His sour face now held sullenness, and something almost like fear. He shouted less, delegated more, and disappeared most of the time as he used to do.

Hutch was by no means certain what, exactly, the crew had done or was doing to affect the change. He knew there were plots, tiny rebelling ways of making a captain regret harsh punishment, but he was not yet well-versed enough in the ship’s ways to know what, exactly, these were, and of course no one would tell him.

He visited Starsky when he could, and once tried to slip him a hunk of dried fruit. Starsky refused it. There was no good scolding him or arguing. They couldn’t have a proper argument, but he felt himself go red up to his ears. He gave Starsky’s arm a shove and stormed from the room, silent and furious, the fruit jammed back into his pocket, his gift and sacrifice refused.

But it was only two days later that the captain reversed whatever order he had given—or perhaps Starsky’s time was simply up—and good old Curly was again at his duties, pale from lack of sun, thin-faced, with his eyes looking very large. He smelled bad, his clothes were highly disreputable, and he ate like a starving man—nibbling at food and throwing up when he ate too much.

The sailors coddled him as they had done and were doing with Hutch. Dobey and the doctor took him especially under their wings, Dobey shielding him from every rough labor as much as possible, and the doctor deciding what he could and could not eat, and how much and how quickly. He was quite strict about it, and all of the sailors conspired, joining forces to make sure the greedy sailor obeyed. Starsky’s face got very long when he could not eat something they were allowed; but all the same, the effort began to tell, and he soon was keeping down larger and larger meals, gaining strength, regaining muscle, getting a bounce back in his steps and a smile back on his face.

Things were different, of course. Hutch felt as if something irrevocable had changed in his life, when he was tied and lashed for saving a man’s life. He felt a hard, stone core had formed, and he could never be a boy again. A boy could believe someone would be there for him, would rescue him and see he was treated fairly. But the sailors couldn’t or wouldn’t, the captain had ordered it, and the officers had stood by as well.

He was, more truly than ever, alone.

As for Starsky, he seemed surprisingly unchanged. Again, he thrived on shipboard life, performing his duties, eating with gusto, and running to the top of the rigging like a monkey. Hutch watched him sometimes, could not understand it. Curly seemed more like a boy than ever, with events like those that had hardened Hutch seeming to only have the effect of making him younger and more carefree, now that they were mostly past. (Mostly, for some tension still remained onboard ship—but the captain’s harshness had abated, as he kept to his cabin more and more.)

Curly certainly had a greater feeling of gratitude than Hutch could quite like, smiling his thanks even when Hutch would much rather he’d forget it and just be a friend again, just a regular friend, not the man who owed him his life.

When he figured out Hutch disliked it much brought up, he changed his tack; but sometimes Hutch still saw that look in his eyes—a soft, grateful look. He didn’t like that, didn’t like it one bit. This Starsky character seemed to think he was some kind of hero, when he’d just been doing what anyone should.

#

Hutch had heard there were certain dangers aboard ships for boys; and he had long been considered too pretty for his own good. It had led to teasing and tormenting about his fair hair and smooth skin from his schoolboy peers. This had sorely tried him when he was younger and less skilled at hiding his dismay, and it was not without sore misgivings that he’d joined the company of the regular, rough crewmen.

But this too was different than he’d been told. He was not accosted once, and the men treated him always as a respected, valued crewman. Although he sometimes got the feeling they saw him as a very small child, whether from his lack of skill aboard a ship, being so new here, or from his deafness, he could not tell. But when they did treat him as a child, it was like a child they were very fond of.

Whenever he was off duty, and had a chance to grab a few hours’ sleep, Hutch noticed that, unless their sleeping shifts did not coincide, Starsky and Dobey always slung their hammocks quite near him, so that he was enclosed by a friend on either side. Sometimes he’d catch a blue eye staring at him, meditatively, softly, under a shock of wild, curly hair. Hutch closed his eyes or looked away quickly, so he would not have to look at that soft, grateful look on Starsky’s face. He’d come to hate that look.

And so their friendship did not progress as much further as one would have thought, after the incidents that had led them here; if anything, it regressed, as they had less time to fool around (more chores being assigned, the men kept quite busy by the lieutenant, no doubt hoping to avoid any lingering rumbles of mutiny). With less time to explore the ship, less time to write or practice shipboard skills together, less time to play with or even tend the animals, and simply less time together, they began to drift apart.

Hutch felt himself going further and further into his own silent world. He did not seek words nor bother trying to read people’s lips. He felt curiously hard and cold inside, bothered still, every day, by the wounds that had long since healed outwardly. Oh, he had a few scars—but they did not matter. They did not hurt. Yet the captain’s beating remained in his heart in some curious way, and he could not let it go, could not forget, as much as he would like to sometimes, staring at the ceiling, lying in his hammock, feeling the roll and creek of the ship, so comforting beneath him.

Sometimes he envied Starsky, sleeping peacefully so near, content and able to simply let the past go, and act like a child in the rigging the next day.

#

The captain’s condition continued to worsen. His symptoms were discussed among the crew in great detail, and with touching sympathy—never a harsh word, but always the feeling underneath of relishing each new disastrous bout with intestinal trouble, or when he could not eat, or when the light became painful to his eyes and he couldn’t leave his cabin, much less have a lantern turned high.

It was times like these that made Hutch glad he could not easily be involved with all of the discussions; he was glad to be apart from such rapaciousness. He had no love for the captain, but gloating over another person’s illness seemed awfully coldblooded to him. Especially when it was as slow and painful as the captain’s obviously was.

In fact, the captain’s condition continued to worsen, to the point where the surgeon visited two and more times a day, looking grimmer and grimmer each time he left carrying his medicine case.

Soon, all orders came from the lieutenant. The captain never emerged from his cabin at all. The lieutenant was now fully in charge of the ship, as the captain was in no condition to give orders whatsoever. With his new authority, Lt. Brown increased grog rations, a sure way to improve morale.

As the tensions lessened on the ship and in the crew, Lt. Brown was less concerned with finding busywork for the men.

They had more breathing room. With it, the curly-headed sailor began to again seek out Hutch’s company, to spend more time with him. He became difficult to avoid, his smiling face popping up all over the place, with a tug on the arm or a quick note he’d scrawled to try to convince Hutch to come explore the ship with him, or climb the rigging or go to the kitchen to try to beg extra scraps from the cook (a tolerant man if ever there was one).

It became difficult to avoid Starsky, and after Hutch’s first few vague, head-shaking and shrugging excuses—pointing to unfinished work that could have waited, or yawning to show he hadn’t the energy—Curly began to get a suspicious, hurt look on his face, and asked less often.

He climbed the rigging on his own, and stood staring out at sea, hooked in the rigging’s ropes, as at ease as if he’d been born to stand there.

By now, Hutch was nearly as tanned as a real sailor, and his hair had burned brighter. He could climb to the crow’s nest—and actually had hope of being able to climb it someday without turning completely white under his tan. He could keep his food from rolling away, keep his balance on the ship when it tilted, get into and out of a hammock on his own, and perform actual, useful work on the ship. And that was more than he had ever thought he’d manage.

When he staring up at Starsky, who stood tangled in the rigging, his hair and clothes loose and flapping as he faced the open sea, something made Hutch want to climb up there as well, and talk to the sailor.

But what was the point? He was shielded in silence, and it seemed too great a distance to cross or be crossed, even with written words, even with smiles and adventures around the ship.

He always turned back to his duties.

#

One thing he still enjoyed, especially now that he had more time for it, was sketching in his journal. He drew still lives with cups, saucers, and bits of staged hardtack. He drew fishes and seagulls, and the tiny, busy weevils.

Starsky sat down next to him one day, smiling and pointing to his drawing, and Hutch, startled, turned away, shielding the book with one hand. He hadn’t realized he was being watched. Another drawback of being deaf; he couldn’t hear people sneaking up on him.

After a moment, Starsky got up and went away. Hutch found himself breathing a sigh of relief, rather guiltily.

He saw Curly hugging the chickens and ducks sometimes again now, telling them his secrets; but Hutch couldn’t quite bring himself to go back to being the happy-go-lucky, childish boy who’d listened to the sailor’s secrets without being able to hear them. He just didn’t feel he could let himself get close to anyone like that again. He was on his own now, and he’d best get used to it.

A short while later, Starsky reappeared and thrust a soiled scrap of paper into his hands, frowning indignantly. WHY DO YOU HATE ME NOW? it read.

Frowning, Hutch shook his head impatiently. "I don’t." He pushed the note away. "I just want to be alone right now, all right?"

Starsky stared at him, affronted, hurt-looking. Hutch looked back, frowning as well. At last, Starsky got up abruptly and walked off, stuffing the scrap into his pocket and walking away with tough strides. Hutch watched him leave, then bent quickly over his book again, beginning to sketch, to lose himself in it, and push away the nagging guilt that he was treating Curly poorly with little excuse.

That night, Dobey was frowning at him, showing with lowered eyebrows, no words necessary, that he was disappointed in Hutch.

The sailors had gathered on deck the way they often did now, to sport and carry on with their songs and their pipes and traditional dances. Today, Starsky didn’t sit next to him. So often he did, his eyes alive from whatever light was available, sitting cross-legged, clapping along with the music Hutch couldn’t hear.

Today he sat on the opposite side of the assembled group, next to Dobey, not smiling or clapping. He leaned his head on the older man’s shoulder, like a little boy seeking comfort. It seemed strange to see him so, neither bouncy nor fierce, just…sitting there.

Hutch averted his gaze again at the frown Dobey was sending him, and forced himself to study the dance. It was a wilder one than he’d ever danced at any of the balls or parties he’d attended. There, the music was measured, the dancers bowed to one another and danced with decorum. Their circles cut in and out of one another, men and women in the polite, social dances that allowed the other sort of dances: courtship, attraction, jealousy and rivalry and pairing off, marriages and who was who, because of who they married.

Here, it was simply music, wild and carefree or sad and aching for home. He felt as if he could hear it sometimes, almost just by the looks on their faces, and then he felt homesick, too, and thought of Huggy and the plantation and the horses and his mother, and even father, too. He’d noticed, on the sad songs, that Starsky seemed to retreat inwardly. He never showed homesickness on his face, but rather a blank look; and he would look away, out over the sea, and sometimes not stick around at all, but rather slip away and find something else to do until a cheerful song began again. Hutch wondered about that, but not overly. Some people had difficulty expressing sad emotions. Curly seemed to have no difficulty with cheerful ones.

Even now today, when he was brooding about Hutch, he didn’t stay sad for long. He got up and jumped into the middle of the ring for one of the wild, free dances, twisting and jumping and clapping and leaping. He looked like some kind of night creature with his skin as dark and tanned as a dry loaf of bread. His teeth flashed in the firelight, his hair getting loose from its queue and springing out wildly this way and that. But even so, Hutch couldn’t miss that his dance was different than usual, as if he were throwing himself into it harder than ever, wildly, to cover some darker feeling inside.

And that night, Dobey and Curly did not sling their hammocks on either side of Hutch. He was instead surrounded by two large men; the cook and his assistant, Hutch’s particular friends. They slept with loud snores, and no one peeked a warm blue eye at him at all.

　

　

　


	7. Chapter 7

　

Chapter seven

　

　

The next day the sailors, better gossips than any old ladies, seemed to have all Curly’s and Hutch’s business spread around the ship. By the telltale looks and pats on the back he received, while Starsky received others from different people, it became apparent to Hutch that the men were choosing sides, and if he didn’t make up with Curly, the ship would be divided again.

When Curly next climbed the rigging and stared out at sea, Hutch climbed up reluctantly to join him, hooking his arms awkwardly through the ropes and balancing precariously. He stood close to Curly, but didn’t look at him right away, rather, out at sea, psyching himself up for the apology which he didn’t know how to phrase, or even exactly what he needed to apologize for.

When he finally looked at the sailor, he realized Curly was engaged, had been talking to him already with an intent, rather friendly look on his face. He smiled now, an awkward half smile, as if offering his own apology. He reached over and gave Hutch’s shoulder a shake, smiling to show he meant no harm. Then he raised his hand and drew it away. He stood back and said nothing else, but cast his eyes in Hutch’s direction once in a while, as if to gauge how he was doing.

"You realize I have no idea what you just said?" enquired Hutch.

Starsky nodded, smiling, looking partly sheepish, partly content.

"All right then." Hutch looked back out at sea. This was easier than he’d imagined. Yet somehow he was not content. He hadn’t said anything, hadn’t even made it firm in his mind what had been bothering him. "I suppose it was something about how we have to get along so the crew doesn’t start to bicker?" He glanced at Starsky again, this time to see him shake his head in dismay.

No, no.

Curly raised his hands, shrugging broadly at the inexpressible, and Hutch leaned closer, studying hard, trying to make out his next, rather hesitant words. He wished he were better at this; it was such an irritation, communicating.

Starsky, seeing his expression, formed exaggerated words, mouthing broadly. " _Won’t push you_ ," he seemed to say. He formed the words with his hands as well, shaking his head, miming a push, pointing to Hutch.

"Won’t push me?"

Starsky nodded, flashing a quick smile.

"You mean to be friends?"

Again, Starsky nodded.

"All right then." Hutch nodded and looked out to sea again. "Only—you know. I don’t want to push you away exactly—well, sometimes. I just don’t want to be dependent on anybody, or anybody to be dependent on me." He looked at him, trying to gauge his expression.

Starsky shrugged.

Hutch sighed. "I’m not making sense. It doesn’t make sense to me, either. But I wish you wouldn’t look at me like I’m some hero, like I’m your best pal in the world because I dived in to drag you back." He turned a frown on the boy, and saw him swallow painfully.

Starsky shrugged his shoulders, mouth twisting sideways a little.

"I mean, I wish I could be your friend. But it’s so hard to communicate, and you seem to expect too much from me, and—it’s just easier not to, you know?"

Starsky looked away from him for a while, out to sea, no expression on his face. But he managed to look sad all the same.

"Do you have to do that? Do you have to expect so _much_?" Hutch growled.

Silently, Starsky shook his head. He turned, keeping his head down, and climbed from the rigging without another word.

Hutch stared down after him in dismay, not feeling at all how he’d expected to feel. He thought he’d feel relieved. Instead, an odd hollowness seemed to have taken up inside him. And that hollowness wasn’t hungry; they had just eaten shortly ago.

#

Starsky was friendly and cheerful; he put on a happy face and pretended nothing was wrong, smiling and nodding at Hutch sometimes, and went back to slinging his hammock on one side of his. The rumors and polarization of the crew died down. Dobey, too, reluctantly seemed to fall in with the plan, slinging his hammock on the other side of Hutch; but there was something disapproving in his eyes still when he looked at Hutch.

The boys climbed the rigging together every few days, by unspoken agreement, pretending they went up to enjoy each other’s company. But Hutch sat and drew or stared out at sea, and Starsky sat on the opposite side to him, watching the waves and ignoring him.

Even though there was a stiffness with it, Hutch found he rather enjoyed the silent companionship, now that it seemed to contain no forced efforts to communicate, and certainly no silent hero worship.

He gave the boy a smile and a friendly shake of the shoulder one day. Curly stared at him, before returning the smile, awkward and uncertain.

Hutch’s hair was growing long and shaggy now, and kept falling forward in his face while he bent over to draw. Starsky volunteered to help him put it in the queue, the sailor’s braid the rest of the crew, including officers, wore. It was a way to keep hair neat when barbers were not available, and many of the crew had long braids and were proud of them. They re-braided each other’s hair every week in time to be neat and well-kept in appearance for the Sabbath, when the whole ship would assemble for some reading of the Articles, a chapter of the Bible, and a hymn and a prayer. It was rather dull for Hutch, now that he could not even hear the familiar words or sing along to the hymn.

The first few times he had seen grown men braiding each other’s hair he’d had to rush away or he’d have laughed aloud; but by now the sight, though incongruous, no longer seemed quite so strange or humorous, and he submitted to Curly’s attentions on his hair. Curly’s hands were careful and light, combing, dividing, and then plaiting Hutch’s hair, tying it at the end carefully with a sailor’s knot. When Hutch looked at himself in the polished brass on the bell later, he did indeed look neater than he had done.

Curly gave him a little note afterwards, "Proper sailer now!" and smiled at him.

Hutch took the pencil, smiling a little ruefully, and corrected ‘sailor.’

#

On a calm, blue day with only a slight breeze, the pirates attacked.

Hutch, who had never been in a battle of any sort, had no idea what to do. Dobey grabbed him by the shoulders and pushed him out of the way, to stand uselessly by. Men went for weapons, and he hurried over to join them, finding a pistol and a wicked-looking sword, quite sharp despite the few dents in its length. He buckled them both on, heavy about his waist and dragging at his pants. He looked around for Curly.

Well, even if they weren’t exactly friends, he didn’t want anything to happen to the kid.

He was still looking around when Curly grabbed his shoulders and turned him around, looking into his face with frantic, searching gaze. Hutch shoved his hands off and frowned at him, indignant at the violation of what he’d come to think of as his personal space. He was deaf, and it made a ring around him that no one was supposed to pass through.

Starsky pointed below, and said something earnestly. Then he tried to drag Hutch down below. Hutch fought him, got free, and gave him a shove, half stumbling, glaring. He moved back up on deck, determined to see it out.

Starsky ran around, grabbed his shoulders and said, very broadly, " _Please hide_."

Hutch colored up indignantly. "You hide!" He ripped free and ran back on deck. And then there was no point to arguing, for the ships had closed, the booming of cannon did little good with the ships hooked together. The great stream of unwashed villains boarded.

The truth was, because he hated fighting and dueling, Hutch had always been rather afraid he was a coward. But now his home, such as it was, was in danger, and if he were ever to prove not to be a coward, this was the time.

He advanced towards a pirate huge, hirsute, and raising pistol. Hutch fired first, and the pirate went down, grabbing at his chest, at the spurt of blood.

If there was any blood that had not drained from Hutch’s face, he would never know; but he advanced again, pulling his sword, and met the next pirate.

His fencing lessons served him well, and although there were no more shots in his pistol, he didn’t do badly. Two confirmed kills, some harrying, one man he fought to quite a draw until the forces of battle separated them, and he turned to help the others.

The two ships rocked, and the decks grew slick with blood, slippery even to the barefoot, well-balanced sailors. Hutch found himself falling again and again, banging elbows, striking knees, but while he was down he struck at the legs of any pirate within reach, bringing more than a few off-balance this way, and giving his fellow-sailors a lucky break.

It was difficult if not impossible to keep track of anyone during a battle; he saw Curly once: his face white, his shirt spattered with a great deal of blood, carrying shot to a cannon. A few moments later, Curly launched himself, sword first, at a pirate, yelling; and then his attention was caught by his own section of the melee, which continued muted around him.

And then, all of the sudden, Curly was there again.

Someone gave Hutch a great shove aside; he had been fighting a pirate, and this left him off-balance and falling. When he caught himself, he turned to see Curly fighting two pirates desperately, standing now where Hutch had stood; one quite close behind, and one in front of him. They closed on him, no matter what he tried to do, and he was not bad with a sword, either.

Hutch threw himself into the battle, catching the first pirate on the side, buying a second for Curly. Another passing sailor slammed the man with a long hunk of wood. The pirate went down. The sailor moved past without looking at them and raised his plank again; it looked like a hunk of the ship.

Hutch turned to Starsky—only to see the boy falling back, a kick in the chest having made him stagger. A raised sword, a great swipe downwards, and the pirate had caught him; Curly fell, bloody across half his face, and Hutch gave a scream. He launched himself at the pirate, sword-point first, and drove it home, bringing his death count to three. He felt sick. He turned to see Curly, lying quite still.

There was nothing else to do; he threw away his sword and dragged him, past other dead and battling, down into the surgeon’s.

Here, many wounded already waited, but Bixley turned to Curly in only moments, making several other, less gravely wounded men wait. Bixley’s face was grim and set. He made Hutch hold a rag to the welling blood. The wound was not as deeply as Hutch had first thought, but it had nevertheless left a gash from Curly’s scalp to nearly his chin, leaving quite a lot to cover. The surgeon returned in a moment with needle and thread and began stitching shut the divided skin and flesh; Hutch looked away, biting his lip.

The surgeon pushed him away at last, and he looked down to see Curly sewn up, lying insensible, with the doctor winding a thick bandage around half his face. He nodded to another man he needed help with. Hutch started to shake his head, and pointed back towards the fight. If Curly didn’t need him now, then he must help above. But the surgeon caught his arm and propelled him forward, to where a man was kicking and screaming in agony, and needed held down so the surgeon could finish his grisly task.

#

Hours later, Hutch seemed to come to himself again. He’d spent the time fetching, holding down, even done clumsy stitching when Bixley, called away quickly for a much worse case, had thrust the needle into Hutch’s hand so he could finish the job.

He was so tired it hurt to stand, hurt to breathe; hurt in a dozen places, in muscles and bones and sinews he hadn’t known existed. He tried to sit down, missed the recently-emptied chair, and collapsed on the floor. The surgeon scowled at him, yanked him to his feet, and pointed upstairs. "BED," he mouthed firmly. Hutch winced a little. For a moment, he’d almost thought he heard the word; the sound had reached his brain, caused a twinge of pain.

He forgot the odd sensation a moment later when he climbed on deck. The battle, long past, had been won, but at painful cost. The deck was being cleaned, the dead laid out for burial at sea, the sails and rails being repaired. The ragged ship limped away. No pirate vessel lay in sight; they had left well enough to go under their own steam, which was a bad sign, surely.

His mind went to Curly again. The sailor had lain insensible the whole time on one of the cots, bandaged and pale. Hutch now walked to his hammock and crawled in. It took two tries. He stretched out, dead to the world.

When he awoke, much refresh, and much chagrinned, he saw he’d slept in bloody clothes, now crunchy and stiff and sickening-smelling. He went above deck and cleaned up the best he could, joining other men who washed over buckets that quickly needed replaced with fresh water. Men stripped naked with little thought of privacy, and for once, Hutch did not quibble. He got clean as quickly as he could and dressed in his other clothes, shivering painfully in the cold air. He went to the kitchen, both to warm up and to get something to eat. Regular meals had not yet commenced, but the cook’s helper handed him a big bowl of soup and a large chunk of bread. He crouched in the corner, over his food, devouring with a hunger he’d not have thought possible, after the terrible, terrible day.

Afterwards, he went to see Curly.

The surgeon’s was in a state of organized chaos, but compared to how it had looked during the battle, it seemed clean and roomy. Fewer people stretched out, fewer cots. Hutch realized both the worst and the least hurt of the patients were gone; the former no doubt joining their comrades on the planks of the deck, the latter perhaps moved to other quarters, or even well enough to go back to work.

The surgeon slumped at his desk, head down, asleep. The assistant giving water to a man who could not raise his head.

Quietly, Hutch stepped around and between people. Curly he found in the same spot. He looked deathly white still, but his bandage had bled, leaving frightening blood spots visible through it; and he was thrashing and moaning. One hand reached up towards the injured half of his face, and he opened his mouth in what could only be a cry of pain. His one good eye held a glazed look that didn’t speak of any recognition whatsoever. But Hutch squeezed his hand quickly and then hurried to the cabinet for laudanum. He made Curly drink some, and stroked his arm until he lay back, panting and deeply drugged and began to drift off again.

He seemed to stare through Hutch, not seeing him, not seeing anything. Hutch stayed by him till he was asleep and then checked along the other patients, to be sure no one else needed anything desperately. He fetched two glasses of water, and held a man’s hand while the light left his eyes; and afterwards, he went on deck and leaned over the rail and was sick, losing the meal he’d eaten and what felt like half his guts besides.

Dobey found him, trembling, holding his knees and crying, hiding behind some great coils of rope. Even these were not without their flecks of blood. He’d forgotten that people could hear him cry, even when he could not hear them. Dobey sat down beside him, and stroked a big, awkward hand back over his head and tugged him close to lean against him. Hutch felt the rumble of words in Dobey’s chest, felt as if he could, almost, if he tried to, make sense of them; but instead he fell asleep, swollen-eyed and lost, next to the comforting warmth of Dobey.

　

　


	8. Chapter 8

　

Chapter eight

　

　

After that he began to feel more like himself again. There were still blood stains on his hammock, but there were plenty to spare now; he found a clean one and used it until his own could be washed. He slept a great deal. He helped on deck willingly and wherever needed. And he checked on Curly when he could spare the time—and could force himself to go below.

Worrying about the other boy made him feel half sick all the time, but there seemed nothing he could do about that. The rest of the ship was so preoccupied with recovering from the attack, getting back under way, and dealing with the dead, dying, and wounded that his own concerns seemed small and private. He was again locked away alone, dealing with this without any but the brusque and hurried sympathy of the surgeon, who had been and was still being run off his feet, and Dobey, who truly did understand but was quite busy himself.

Food tasted like sawdust to Hutch, and he could not eat for several hours after seeing Curly; for the sailor boy’s condition was worse now. He was nearly constantly in a drugged fog, and he burned with fever. Hutch put cool cloths on him, stroked his arm, and talked to him, but it was like talking to a statue for all the boy seemed notice.

Hutch could never manage to stay very long, and abruptly ran from the room more than once. Dobey was a far more faithful companion, giving Hutch a pat on his way out and then staying to tend the boy if he needed it.

This lasted for two weeks.

Most of the ship had returned to normal—repairs made, friends and neighbors buried, people recovered or dead, with only a few still lying in sick bay.

Starsky, at last, lost his fever. It had been touch and go, but he was awake now, alive. He was thin and pale, and his dressing, when it was changed, no longer bled, though his wound had an ugly look to it, and his eye was swollen and strange-looking. But he had a smile for Hutch, that day, and took his hand, and for the second time on board, Hutch cried.

Curly looked so upset by this that he tried to sit up, and several hands pushed him back. The surgeon pulled Hutch aside until he could get back his equanimity.

When he turned back, he had a smile and a nod for Starsky. Starsky cocked his good eyebrow enquiringly and waggled his fingers for Hutch to come nearer; it was an indication of just how weak he was that he could barely raise his hand before it flopped back to the sheet.

Obligingly, Hutch moved closer, but then he started to cry again and burst out, "You idiot! You shouldn’t have interfered! I was fine!"

Everyone looked at him, and Starsky, in a quick flame of anger, yelled something that ended with the words—Hutch recognized them—"you—die—?" His mouth twisted bitterly.

"I was fine!" Hutch repeated, yelling even louder now; he heard it ringing inside his head, echoing from two directions it seemed— "You idiot, you moron! Serve you right if you had!"

And this was such a horrible thing to think, much less say, that he ran from the room, up the rigging, and didn’t come down till dusk.

His silence must’ve been forbidding, he thought. No one tried to communicate with him, that night or the next day. And shortly he realized that everyone was simply busy with their own lives; no one cared about him enough to bother. Why should they? He’d never let anyone in.

Sometimes it was terrible being Hutch, entombed in silence and entombed in the deeper silence of his own making. He knew the truth now; he hadn’t let anyone get close. They had liked him well enough, but now they just left him alone, because that was how he’d wanted it. And now that he didn’t, and he didn’t know how to change it.

He cried himself to sleep, and the third day went shamefaced back to the sick bay. Everything seemed quiet, and there were fewer left in the infirmary yet again today. One man had lost a leg, one had a broken arm, and Curly, lying on his cot staring at the ceiling had one eye and a miserable face.

His one eye.

He wore a patch over the other. The scars were still red and painful to look at, running from his scalp down nearly to his chin. He looked so unhappy.

Hutch stood in the doorway, gripping the wood, afraid to enter, afraid to leave. At last he couldn’t stand it anymore. He whirled to run, more cowardly than he’d been in the battle.

A sound stopped him, or something like one—a very faint sound. "Hutch!" It was a tiny, pitiful sound, echoing unpleasantly in his heart. He turned, and saw Curly looking at him, his mouth wobbly, his one eye pleading and anguished.

Hutch hurried to his side, almost stumbling over the cot’s leg. He held Starsky’s hand and knelt by his bed, stroking his hair, promising that he hadn’t meant it, he really hadn’t.

Curly rolled towards him and wept, curling his skinny body around Hutch’s hand, clinging to it with everything he had. Hutch enveloped him the best he could and held him while he cried.

#

After that a terrible thing happened; Hutch’s hearing came back, slowly and faintly at first, but enough to leave him vulnerable to the world of sounds, the bells and whistles of shipboard life, the running feet, shouting of orders, and the laughter and coarse jokes and voices of everyone jammed aboard the _Bonhomme_.

He could most of the time hear Dobey’s gruff, grumbled voice now. The man was busy, but whenever he was near, he seemed to find an excuse to spend a moment or two with Hutch. Even thinking Hutch couldn’t hear him, he offered gruff reassurances anyway. They reached down inside and warmed Hutch greatly.

He spent what time he could with the curly-haired sailor now. Starsky was very weak and could only get up and walk briefly. He was allowed on deck, but needed someone’s arm to hold onto. Hutch did this when Dobey was busy, and helped him back down again. Trembling with weakness, Starsky collapsed on his cot again and looked up at Hutch with haunted eyes, begging him silently not to leave.

When they were alone, he talked to Hutch, saying the most outrageous and non sequiturthings, coming out with them as if they meant nothing at all. "I dreamed about that girl again last night," he say, and then in the next breath start talking about some food he was hungry for and hadn’t eaten in six years, or what he was going to name the new chicken. And sometimes he’d say "Please don’t go," in such a quiet little voice that Hutch could never disobey. He read to Curly sometimes, to shut him up, to stop his odd and confusing confidences. He read in a calm voice, going over animals and medical things and even reading some of his early logs, the ones that dealt with weather and nothing important.

Eventually, Curly could walk on his own, stay on deck longer, and sit up and get the sun, squinting, watching the crew and ship work together. He was painfully thin, and his face had a hollow look to it quite frightening even apart from the eye patch. But the crew greeted him heartily, teasing him good-naturedly about how he was a real sailor now, and bringing him little treats to fatten him up. Hutch was rather touched by the concern they showed for Curly. He brought his own set of treats, of course. Starsky had the most grateful smile; it warmed him clear through.

After his good work in the battle and admirable service both before and after it, Hutch was in good with both the lieutenant and the sailors. Wilbur, the midshipman, showed a marked degree of sullenness, but he did nothing openly. Hutch had no idea what he had or hadn’t done in the battle, but there were dark rumblings among the crew that it had been very little indeed.

Hutch didn’t care for any of that now; he just cared about Curly, and found every excuse to visit him or give him something special, or simply sit beside him. If given half a chance, Starsky would fall asleep in a moment, his head resting on Hutch’s shoulder. Sometimes he started drooling on it, too.

"I heard you, you know. When I was hurting. I heard your voice, telling me it would be all right." Curly spoke so earnestly sometimes, it was all Hutch could do not to look down or flush. He pretended to be the same uncomprehending idiot of before, and simply look mildly enquiring and faintly curious and friendly.

Starsky smiled at him. "I think you brought me through it. So… thanks. And I’m glad you like Dobey now, too. He’s a great guy."

I never disliked him

, thought Hutch, and then wondered if that was how his cool, withdrawn exterior had made it seem.

#

Whereas before he had been party to few secrets, now he was party to almost too many. People talked around him with no self-consciousness. Some, like Curly, even confided their secrets when no one else was around. He wished he could get away from it, shocked by some of the things he heard. He was no priest, to carry people’s secrets around so, and give them absolution. It was terrible. Dobey even began talking about the woman he’d loved and lost, his wife, who was sold away to another plantation.

It was so terrible Hutch had to keep his head turned and his eyes down. He wanted to run away, but he couldn’t; Dobey hadn’t been able to run away from it, even after all these years.

Now Hutch found out why he worked so hard, spent so little; he was saving money, in the hope that sometimes seemed so vain: that he could someday find and free his wife and children.

#

Starsky was not back to fighting trim, but he seemed to grow stronger every day. His one eye was bright, and he stayed cheerful, accepting his lot now as he grew used to it. He climbed the rigging again, almost as monkey-fast as before. Hands reached out to help him often, more often than needed, everyone feeling concerned for his lack of depth vision. But Curly surprised them all; he knew this ship, knew its every inch, and he had lost none of his dexterity with his eye.

At first Hutch found his face disturbing to look at, the one eye and the livid scar and the eye patch—or without it, the flat, scarred lid—but he grew accustomed to it. He soon became simply Curly again, a thin, starved-looking Curly who filled out slowly, and regained his deep tan.

He was also growing facial hair now. Hutch regarded it with jealousy. He and Starsky had been the only two on the ship young enough to not grow beards. Most ships would have at least a few squeakers running here and there on errands, learning the ship from a young age, but for some reason, Curly and Hutch were the youngest two onboard this ship; they were actually a bit short on midshipmen and such, and perhaps this was another reason why Hutch had been accepted onboard at such short notice.

But Curly, with his hairy arms and legs, was now growing an actual, proper beard to join them. Whereas Hutch was, for all practical purposes, still as hairless as he’d been six years ago: his chest was smooth and his face showed the discouraging propensity to never need shaved in his life. If it thought it was saving him time, it was wrong; he’d have been glad to grow even a scraggly beard; perhaps he’d have quit being teased. Oh, it was good-natured, to be sure—but having people catch his chin and turn it and laugh, and tug their own long beards—some so long they reached to the chest, and could be braided into fierce-looking, very sailorish designs—was growing more than a little old.

Curly had never seemed to mind being teased, had taken it good-naturedly, shouting things back to the japing sailors. But now he was growing his own hair, joining that crowd. If anything, it increased the amount of teasing he received, for the moment. And Hutch still found himself bitterly jealous. Not that he would have enjoyed having people peer closer and pretend to count the number of hairs on his face; but all the same it was terrible being the baby, the only one not quite a man.

Being hairless seemed to bring another problem, which he had not been aware of before. A couple of men, safe in the knowledge he couldn’t hear them, would walk up near him and begin to talk dirty to him. Hutch was startled and dismayed by their various words, which didn’t have the teasing atmosphere of the name-calling men so often used amongst themselves. Instead they had more serious, even darker undertones. One man (the least rude, the one who seemed to have an actual soft spot for Hutch and not just enjoy talking dirty), actually said that he would be "better than a girl, hairless but not too soft."

Hutch found some excuse to get away, and shuddered to himself. He was not used to people talking to him that way, and if they’d thought about him so, he’d have rather been kept in the dark about it.

Most of the crew seemed fond and protective of him, though, watching out for him even though he really had found his sea legs now. He’d even proved himself in battle. They still warned him good-naturedly that his soup was too hot, mimed that he should wait to eat it. And they bundled him and Curly up in any even slightly rough weather, too.

Curly, as tough and wiry and even sometimes forbidding as he could occasionally be, seemed to have an incorrigible streak a mile wide. When he was feeling his oats, he’d snatch someone’s hat or neckerchief and race away with it, and, if the person would cooperate at all, make them chase him all across the rigging, hooting and laughing and performing the most dizzying, dangerous stunts.

It made Hutch feel sick to watch, imagining Curly’s vulnerable form falling, landing with a thump on the deck, and lying still. He turned away and tried not to watch; and when Curly tried it with him, he simply would not play.

One day he stood on top of a stack of crates and declared himself the king of the mountain in arrogant tones designed to piss people off. Hutch laughed at him and shook his head, but several large sailors started forward, with the intent of "teaching the cub a lesson." Soon the wrestling match became a free-for-all, and Starsky was brought down, laughing and yelling, and now fighting in earnest as one, then two men piled on him. With a belated start, Hutch recognized one of the dirty-talkers; he rushed forward and laid about him with his fists, trying to get at Curly, trying to get him free from the crush.

The Dobey was there, hauling him off, hauling off first one sailor and then another, and Hutch dived back for Curly. Starsky sat up, coughing, shaking his head and his wild, loose curls, which had come free from their restraint. Hutch made sure Curly was all right and helped him up, then gave him a slap upside the head and walked away. "Hey! You quit that! Come back here. What did I do?" Curly ran after him. All the sailors laughed.

Hutch ignored him. It was easy to ignore him, when he wasn’t supposed to be able to hear him anyway.

"Huuutch!" complained Starsky. "Fine, I’ll pull your pants down and make you a laughingstock!"

Hutch whirled on him, fire in his eyes, and the laughter abruptly stopped.

Starsky stopped, and put his hands on his hips. He looked so like a ragged, disreputable pirate with his shirt open to his waist revealing his tanned, hairy chest, and his slightly askew eye patch, one gold earring and hair wild and loose. All he needed was a gold tooth and a sword to complete the appearance.

"Oh, ho, you heard that, did you?" He tilted his head. "Just how long have you been hearing, anyway?"

Now the crew was deadly silent, serious, all traces of laughter gone. There was probably not one person who had not, sometime during the voyage, said something unguarded in front of the deaf boy. It was a crowded ship, and difficult enough to keep secrets under the best of circumstances. But now…

They looked at him as if he’d become a villainous stranger.

　

　


	9. Chapter 9

　

Chapter nine

　

Hutch flushed and looked down. "Not long." He traced a toe on the wood grain. "After the battle, I started getting a little back. I can still only hear some," he improvised. It was true, but it had been true for most of his life, and he’d gotten along fine even so.

"So you know everybody’s secrets now," said Starsky, implacably.

"No, no," said Hutch, far too quickly, shaking his head, humiliated, wishing like anything Starsky would quit looking at him in that demanding way.

"And what’s to keep you from blackmailing us all?"

"You idiot! What secrets do you have that anyone would give a—give a damn about!" He lunged for Curly, who took a quick, dancing step backwards. "You’re just a little kid who thinks about girls too much! And I don’t think anybody has any decent secrets worth hearing aboard this whole ship!"

He turned and stalked away, and this time Curly let him go.

Hutch hid in the hold and pulled his knees towards his chest, shaking a little every time he heard a rat squeak. It was awful; they knew, and now he’d be reviled. They’d probably turn the dirty-talkers loose on him and let them have their ways with him. He nudged a rat away, and whimpered at the sound it made.

"Hutch?" Starsky’s soft voice. The room darkened as he ducked through the doorway, blotting out what little light came through. "I’m glad ya told." He sat down beside Hutch.

"You told!" Hutch turned aside, glaring fiercely into the dark.

"And if I hadn’t, they’d have been even madder when it came out." He gave Hutch a slap on the leg. "You said just the right thing, so don’t worry about it. Now they’re letting their breath out above there and joking around. Couple people might be pissed—maybe the captain, too—but everything’s all right, everything’s gonna be fine, and Dobey and me’ll take care of you. All right, Hutch? All right? Don’t make that sound no more." He wrapped his arms around Hutch and leaned against him. "It hurts something awful when I hear you sounding like that."

He must’ve been standing there for at least a few moments, to hear Hutch whimper.

"I can’t help it. I hate rats," he said, even though that was only partially the reason. He leaned against Starsky for the warmth and comfort he offered.

"How long have you known?" he at last thought to ask.

"Oh, for a while. Your ears started getting red when I told you things."

"Uh, certain ‘things.’"

"Yeah, exactly. You never did that before. And sometimes you’d turn away and fiddle with something instead of facing me. It didn’t take a lot of smarts to figure out."

"No one else did. Dobey told me some secrets…. I didn’t mean to lie to him. I mean, I do think _his_ secrets are worth knowing. It’s just hard to… hear them."

"He told you some secrets? That’s all right, you just keep ‘em." He patted Hutch’s arm. "You can ‘pologize to him later. I’ll help you. Dobey won’t stay mad."

"He might," said Hutch. "And…there’s some people in the crew…" Reluctant, but needing to tell someone, he confided about the dirty talkers. Curly took it better than he’d thought.

"Ah, sorry, Hutch. I wanted you to stay innocent ‘bout that kinda thing. But yeah, some people are like that. They’re mostly all talk, but don’t stay alone too much, just in case. You got me an’ Dobey to look after you, and most of the people on this ship would jump into the fire for you, after what you did to save me, so don’t you worry. Nobody’s gonna attack our Hutch."

"’Our Hutch?’"

"Yeah, ain’t you heard that one? You’re like the mascot. You’re like the ship’s pet!"

Hutch drew back, highly offended, and Curly burst out laughing. "I’m teasing, buddy." He rubbed a hand back over Hutch’s head, rough and gentle at the same time. "You’re my pet, though."

"Am not." He reached over and pinched the dark-haired sailor boy, and Curly yelped and piled on him. They began to wrestle. In retrospect, it wasn’t the best thing they’d ever done. It was filthy down here, and the rats still squeaked nearby, but Hutch couldn’t bear to give up, and Curly also refused. It was several long moments of arm locks and half-nelsons and knees in the chest before they were both panting like dying men.

"Truce?"

"Truce."

Starsky helped Hutch up, and they emerged into the sunlight again, blinking and rumpled. A great laughter started up, and Hutch looked up quickly.

"Aw haw haw! Hairless ain’t a virgin anymore!" laughed one of the dirty-talking men, pointing. His face had the telltale flush of grog, meaning he’d hit his ration early. "Congratulations, Curly! You done the deed!" He and a couple of others clapped, making knowing faces.

Hutch gaped, realizing just how soiled, crumpled, and flushed they both were from the wrestling.

For once, even Curly didn’t seem to know what to say.

Hutch wished the floor would disappear beneath him and let him sink into the cool, lonely ocean.

#

"You just ignore it, it’ll go away."

"We know, Dobey."

Hutch scratched his head. "But people can’t think—I mean, we were gone a couple of minutes, tops."

Curly sent him an amused glance. "How long ya think sex takes, buddy?"

Hutch flushed. "Longer than that!"

Curly snorted. "Depends how you’re doing it. I knew a girl…"

"Stop it! I’m not listening! Lalalalalalala…" He put his hands over his ears.

Curly grinned and tried to pull his arms down. "Listen up, buddy. You've got a lot to learn!"

"AHEM." Dobey cleared his throat, and pulled Curly away from Hutch. "Don’t react to the teasing, and it’ll go away. But it’ll help if you two aren’t in each other’s pockets all the time. Give each other a little space. You don’t want this coming up before the captain. You’re not guilty of anything but accusations like these have trouble going away if they get into the log."

They looked at him solemnly, and nodded.

The teasing did die down, especially once the lieutenant reinstated Hutch to midshipman after he gave him a scolding for not telling sooner that he’d gotten his hearing back. He needed more people to stand watch, and he’d been impressed with Hutch’s action during and after the battle.

This served to separate him and Curly again. Hutch was moved back to his quarters with Wilbur, the sullen middy. He and Curly were different ranks now, couldn’t fraternize in the same way. And now sailors couldn’t tease him. It was odd to be saluted respectfully by the men who used to tease and help him. He had trouble adjusting.

It was really rather dreadful. He didn’t have anyone to talk to now; and again he had to suffer through dreadful, quiet dinners. The food was good, but the meals were terribly lonely. The lieutenant, while not an unpleasant man like the captain, had no interest in talking to the boys and kept his own counsel most of the time, while good old Wilbur made it apparent he despised Hutch.

But Hutch stood his watches; he played the part of a good midshipman as best he could, learning on the job. He did his best to look proper and well-dressed in his old, neat pants, shirts, and waistcoat, and he would’ve cut a much finer figure if they weren’t getting far too small. Naturally he would have to have a growth spurt in the middle of the ocean, where it was impossible to get new clothes, or even properly alter these.

Wilbur seemed to grow more and more obstreperous, sullen, and likely to yell. It seemed to be exacerbated by the fact that the men listened to Hutch more quickly and willingly and respectful than they listened to him, even though Hutch had been one of them such a short time ago, and even though Hutch was not very good at wielding his new authority, and often got it wrong. (The captain had to take him aside twice and tell him to give orders through the proper chain of command, and not ask the sailors by name to do things; and not to say please and thank you to them, either. He must remain detached.)

In fact, Wilbur grew really rather touchy. When a younger, less confident, smooth-cheeked boy who still tripped over his feet was doing a better job than he, he began to grow red in the face and shout when they were slow or slightly less than respectful in carrying out his orders. He grew rather paranoid, thinking people were talking about him behind his back.

Hutch tried to find excuses to talk to Curly, but it was difficult to find him alone; the ship was small, and their duties overlapped less now. He didn’t get to eat with him or sleep in the same quarters; he couldn’t even find excuses to go aloft with him. Except once in a while, when he needed to go check for something with a spyglass, and if Curly happened to be nearby, they would sort of gravitate towards one another on the rigging and talk in low voices during brief, snatched moments.

"And you’re…?"

"All right. Good food, bad company. Behaving yourself?"

"Oh, of course. You know me…"

"Yeah, you’d never—"

"Sailor!" A voice from below, bellowing. "Get down here and help pump the bilge!"

The lieutenant/acting captain had ordered a daily cleaning of the bilge, where they let in fresh sea water to the bottom of the ship and then the men pumped it out. It gave the men extra work, not a popular thing, but it did make the ship clean and sweet-smelling, even in the less pleasant parts, and gave them cause to be proud of their well-kept ship. It was also healthier.

So off Curly went, barreling below, and Hutch watched wistfully, rather wishing he got to pump bilge, too.

#

One day Curly laughed on deck at quite another matter (one of the sailors was making hand figures—a rabbit hopping). And Wilbur, already on edge, whirled, red-faced, started towards Curly. "What do you mean by that?!" He raised his riding crop (an affectation—nothing he should have been carrying in the first place). He struck Curly across the face with it.

Curly gave a little cry—very uncharacteristic. He said later that it had surprised him; he’d never have yelped in pain if he hadn’t been surprised. He stood with his head lowered, hand to his cheek, blood welling. He kept his gaze down the whole time the midshipman shouted at him, saying all sorts of things about respect and how dare he?

Hutch, emerging from belowdecks, stood frozen for one long moment, as his blood first froze and then began to boil. Then he strode forward, shoved Wilbur away from Curly, and, fumbled with his too-small gloves, dropped them, and struck Wilbur across the face with his hand instead. "I’m calling you out, you disgusting piece of horseshit. Curly—somebody get him to the surgeon! I’m calling you out, right now, you villain—you coward! What’ll it be? Pistols? Swords? Name your weapon!"

Wilbur flushed to his roots. "I haven’t picked a second yet, and we’re not allowed to duel at sea."

Hutch spat on the deck. "Coward. Yellow-bellied—"

Wilbur bridled, flushing. "Pistols! I have a dueling set." He turned and nearly ran to his cabin.

The deck was grim and quiet. The sailors stood around, fierce and wordless. This was highly irregular; no seconds, not waiting till land, yet something about Hutch’s salty, fire-filled temper seemed to make it all unreal somehow.

He stood on deck, steaming at the ears, wondering if he’d gone insane at all, wondering when the lieutenant would interfere. But it was the middle of the day, and the man slept now, having taken the night watch. If no one fetched him, they were quite likely to get away with it. At least…until afterwards.

Hutch had begun to tremble. He thought it was tension or anger. Suppose it really was cowardice?

I’ve never dueled…I’ve never wanted to duel before. I’ve avoided dueling with all my might. I hate it when my father duels. Oh, I’m such an idiot, an all-fired idiot…

Wilbur returned with the guns.

"Here now, just a minute." One of the older sailors moved forward with an air of competency. "You need to take your shirts off, or you’ll get an infection if one of you finds your mark. And everyone should get off deck in case you don’t. Now let someone trustworthy check both guns."

The bosun stepped forward, very grim. The lieutenant still hadn’t emerged; perhaps they would get away with it.

Hutch accepted his gun. He was trembling, shivering without his shirt, and wishing he’d simply punched Wilbur on the nose. Then if there had been a calling-out, it would’ve been on Wilbur’s side and Hutch could’ve chosen the weapon. He’d have chosen swords, and far less deadly they’d have been, too. First blood called it, whereas first blood from a gun could easily kill a man. It was some consolation to realize Wilbur looked just as white as Hutch felt.

They marched off the paces, Hutch feeling half sick.

The men watched grim-faced from the opening to below-decks, many of them unable to see, and the ones who could calling down in whispered hushes, "Now they’re facing each other! Now they’re pacing off! Now they’re aiming!"

Hutch hoped he wouldn’t faint.

Angry as he still was, he didn’t want to kill a man in cold blood, even if that man had hurt Starsky. Hutch must look as pale as sail. He hoped he wouldn’t humiliate himself irrevocably. He bit his lip, and tried to keep his eyes hard, silently praying that neither would die today.

They took aim, and fired. Two explosions rocked the quiet deck, over the creaking of the sails and ropes and the unheard, familiar hush of the sea. Hutch opened his eyes, and wondered if he was dead. The sky was very blue, and across from him, the white-faced Wilbur had a spot of blood on his arm. He staggered, dropped his gun, and reached up to touch it.

The surgeon emerged, wiping his hands, grim-faced.

He stopped. "I see you’ve done it." He spoke with disgust, and moved to the injured boy, and Hutch, realizing shakily that he was alive and untouched, moved to the rail and lost his lunch.

 

 

 

 


	10. Chapter 10

　

Chapter ten

　

　

　

The lieutenant was furious when he found out what had happened.

"One or both of you could’ve died. Wilbur still might, if an infection sets in, God forbid. And then you could be hanged. I want your word you’ll never do anything so foolish and wicked again. Dueling on deck! At sea! And with pistols…" His expression was very stern indeed.

"I promise," said Hutch.

"Good. Now you’re busted back to sailor able, and you’ll be whipped at assembly this evening. I’m sure you’ll take it like a man—since you’re man enough for dueling."

Hutch blinked. Then after a moment he said, "Yes sir." He saluted and let as soon as he was dismissed, to await his fate.

He found Starsky on deck, already back to work and bandaged. He was pale and bleeding a little through the bandage. Hutch walked up to him. "All right?"

Curly turned away, and continued sweeping, his mouth set in a firm, angry line.

"Not talking to me?" Hutch tried to smile. "I’m busted back to sailor able. You’re allowed again." He tucked his thumbs through his belt loops. The sailor still ignored him. "Won’t you talk to me, Curly?"

But, bandaged and furious, Curly would neither look at nor speak to him.

Hutch slunk away and hid in the hold, pulling his knees up to his chest and biting his lip. He didn’t want to be afraid of his coming beating, but he was, with every inch of his back. The memory of his first hadn’t died away yet. Then it had been sudden, with no time to dread or feel anxious ahead of time, and he’d been so furious he hadn’t cried. But if he was almost crying now—after he’d nearly killed a man, and everything had changed, he was about to be beaten, and now Curly was mad at him, too—how would he ever manage not to when the time came for him to ‘be a man?’

After a little while, Curly came down. "You gonna be all right?" He leaned in the doorway.

Hutch quit biting his lip long enough to say shortly, "Hope so."

Starsky sighed, walked over, and sat down beside him. "Wish you’d keep a better rein on your temper. You could’ve died, you know, and it’s only a scratch."

"Only a scratch! You’ll probably be scarred for life…" And then he wished he hadn’t spoken; Curly turned an amused, laughing expression on him.

"Yeah? And like I’m not already? Give it a rest, Hutch. You don’t gotta stick up for my honor. Any idea how much harder it’s gonna be to watch you get whipped than to stand there and take a bit of unfair abuse? You think my life’s been easy? You think I’ve never been picked on unfairly by officers before?"

"No, no. I just—I didn’t think. I couldn’t let him get away with hitting you."

"Well, congratulations," said Curly with dripping sarcasm. "He didn’t get away with it. And now I gotta watch you get a beatin’, an’ I don’t have the luxury of dueling someone over it."

Hutch hung his head. "Uh—Curly—you won’t think too much less of me, if I’m not, ah, strong and silent, will you?" He glanced over, trying not to look too pathetic or pleading and probably failing miserable at both.

Starsky’s expression changed from sour and scolding to concerned. "Why, wassamatter?" He put an arm around Hutch’s shoulder. "They said you did real good last time—never made a sound or nothing."

"Year, but I was furious—and it was unfair—and this time I’m just…just really nervous, and… I’m not angry enough to feel strong, because I deserve it, really. I should never have started a duel on ship. I’ve never dueled in my life, I never thought I would, and the one time—the one time I do, I break all the rules and just let my anger rule me." He shook his head. "And if he dies, I’ll probably hang for it."

"Don’t say that." Curly crushed him closer in a hug. "You—you don’t get to die. Never."

Hutch laughed. "That doesn’t make sense, Starsk." His laugh sounded shaky, though, and he pushed Curly away. No need for Starsky to feel the uncontrollable trembling in Hutch’s face, arms, and chest.

"Hey. Hey." Curly’s voice got soft. "You really are scared, huh?"

Hutch squinted his eyes shut in shame. "I dunno—I just don’t wanna…I hope I won’t make myself a spectacle." He put his head down on his knees. "I just wish it was over."

"Hutch. Take off your shirt, huh?"

"What?" He looked up, blinking.

"I’ll give you a back scratch. Last time you’ll be able to have one for a while. Maybe it’ll calm you down, help or something. Come on." He gave him a pat and then helped him take his shirt off; Hutch’s hands were shaking too hard to handle the buttons.

"Just relax. I promise it’ll be all right."

"What if it’s not?"

"Then I’ll get you out of it. Whatever happens—I’ll get you out of it."

"You can’t promise that." He closed his eyes at the first feel of light fingernails, running down his skin. Curly used his palms, his fingers, and his nails.

It didn’t exactly have the hoped reaction. Instead of calming down and ceasing to shake, Hutch bowed his head and wept.

"What? Hutch, what? Don’t do that. Come here." He wrapped his shirt around Hutch again, and then his arms. "Wassamatter? You cold? Hey—c’mon. Stop ‘at. Hutch!" His voice started to break.

He got control at last and wiped at his eyes. "No—sorry, Curly. Not helping." He drew away from him a little, and Curly back off.

"You mean th’ backrub?"

"Yeah. ‘Fraid it’s just making me feel more s-sensitive. Probably gonna make it worse, y’know." He kept his voice as even as possible, staring at the floor. Too difficult, to have Curly’s kindness and the gentle hands juxtaposed with what was coming later. He couldn’t handle it.

"Sorry," said Curly gruffly. He put an arm around Hutch’s shoulder and gave him an awkward half-hug. Then he got up abruptly and left the room.

Hutch stared humiliated at the floor. Think he could’ve at least kept from crying for five minutes with his best friend in the world.

Well, Curly _was_ his best friend now that Huggy was free. He didn’t—he wouldn’t—regret it, but sometimes he missed Hug.

Shortly, Curly returned. "Here, Hutch. Drink this."

"What is it?" He peered up at the dark bottle and accepted it, took a sniff. "Laudanum? How’d you—"

"Don’t ask questions. Drink some. It’ll make it hurt less when the time comes. Won’t be long, Hutch. You keep your head down and they won’t see if your eyes get a little glazed, nobody’ll know and it won’t hurt so much."

"Feel like I’m cheating."

"Hutch, if you don’t drink that, after I went to all the trouble—"

"All right. All right. Thank you," he added belatedly. He took a good gulp, felt his senses dulling almost right away. It would help; Curly had been clever. It had a calming, sleepifying effect. He’d make it. He knew he would, now…

#

He bore it silently, and spent only a few days in sickbay recovering. Wilbur was actually out first, and very sour-expressioned, strutting around and being even a worse boss.

When Hutch was out and back to his own job, though, ah, then the trouble began. Wilbur's wrath had an outlet now, and he played it for all it was worth. He assigned Hutch to the worst duties, harshest, hardest, most filthy and humiliating, and worse, made him take double shifts, waking him when he was exhausted and setting him to work again.

If the captain knew, then he sanctioned it; for he worked Hutch hard, too, and Curly -- and did his best to keep them on separate watches or, failing that, on separate parts of the ship.

Hutch was set to pumping bilge endlessly, till his hands formed blisters and the blisters burst and still he must work, until he ended up in sickbay. That brought him a two day break. The surgeon bandaged his hands and gave him laudanum, and Curly snuck away twice to see him at night; that was well. He stayed for a few moments, talked to Hutch and put on a brave face and smiled, said everything was quite all right for him. He brought Hutch a little piece of wood he'd carved into the shape of a duck.

It was hard to tell in the dark, but Curly seemed thin and exhausted, vulnerable and barely hanging on. Hutch felt much that way himself. Yet he felt much refreshed by his visitor.

Their treatment grew harder and harder to bear. With the lieutenant turning a blind eye, Wilbur seemed free to pile every indignity on them; and not simply on Hutch. Before long, he felt like a walking dead man, so sleep deprived he could barely stand.

He worked with a doggedness that had kept him from quitting anything in his life, any task, as much as he might've been resigned in failure over relationships with his father, his neighbors, and even the girls he seemed to fall for hopelessly. Ken Hutchinson was no quitter, and apparently neither was David Starsky.

They were kept apart. Once after two weeks of this abuse he was brought up short by the sight of a man stepping into his path; someone not very tall, slightly shorter than him but stockier, a dark-haired man with a small, grubby beard and a shockingly dark patch over one eye. Hutch blinked, and suddenly it resolved into Curly. He hadn't seen him in so long, he hadn't recognized him at first.

Starsky blinked as well, and then he said, "Hutch," in a little croak. He reached out.

"Sailor!" snapped someone, and they both jumped. Starsky hurried above decks with his head lowered, a harried expression on his face. Hutch swallowed and stared after him; he was just getting off duty while Starsky was just going on, apparently. He had better grab what minutes of sleep he could, before the torture of sleep deprivation continued.

But once they did get away for a few minutes, and curled up together in a pile of ropes deep in the bowels of the ship. They were both half falling asleep, but it was some comfort to be together in the quiet.

"What're you gonna do when we land?" Hutch yawned prodigiously.

"See my Ma and Pa." Starsky yawned too.

"Thought they were...?"

"Oh, yeah. Their graves." He pillowed his head on Hutch's shoulder, and shut his eyes.

"I think I'm just gonna go to sleep for six months," said Hutch, and let his own eyes fall shut. Someone found them there, and shook them awake, sent them about their business. But Hutch woke feeling more rested than he had for a month, leaning on the sturdy, stinky Starsky.

#

The rough treatment prevailed for over a month; then Starsky fell and sprained his ankle, and Hutch caught a dreadful cold after standing watch in a storm. They made an unhappy pair in sickbay; Hutch couldn't stop sneezing.

The lieutenant came to see them to be sure they were not malingering, and the surgeon pulled him aside for a few words. After that, the rough treatment subsided; Wilbur was kept much more in hand; the double shifts ended, and they were occasionally allowed to work together.

Now that he could hear, Hutch enjoyed the music nights even more. He clapped along and even sang, but never danced. Curly caught him singing one time, quietly to himself in the rigging, swaying back and forth, enjoying the breeze. "Hutch, you have a beautiful voice."

Hutch waved his hands. "No, no."

"You have to sing next time, Hutch. Don't argue."

"No, no!" Hutch flushed.

But all the same he ended up singing Danny Boy two weeks later for everyone on the whole ship, standing with his hands clasped behind his back, as if reciting in school. He had a high, rather sweet voice; he always had done. It hadn't deepened much even when his voice broke. He was used to it, but they stared at him as if he had the voice of an angel. When he finished, they clapped and clapped and he bowed deeply, and then went to sit by Curly again, rather hiding behind him and Dobey.

After that they always wanted him to sing, and some nights Curly poked at him in his hammock, and whispered to him to please sing, just sing a little something to help him sleep. Sometimes Hutch poked back and told him to shut up and go to sleep. But some nights he pulled his hammock nearer and sang in a whisper, just for Curly's ear.

Since his hair was rather fine and slippery and still rather short, it grew messy easily, slipping out of his short braid. Curly would comb it out and re-braid it for him.

Hutch had never learned to sew, an important skill for a sailor, who must do without tailors and new clothes, and Curly taught him, although it took many finger stickings before he grew proficient. Curly laughed at him every time, and then came over and helped him.

They seemed to keep getting closer, whether they wanted to or not. When no one and nothing kept them apart, Hutch didn't spend all his time with Curly. But he always knew where he was without having to think or guess. Any time of day he knew where Curly was. If Curly got hurt he knew instantly.

It was a small floating village, difficult to lose anyone for long, really; but even so this incredible connection was new to him and a strange. Even with Huggy, his best friend practically since birth, this unconscious connection had never been so strong.

Sometimes, he felt as if he knew everything Curly was going to say, felt as if they could've been blood brothers or twins. Other times they couldn't have seemed more different; the foreignness of Curly's mind went deeper than he could comprehend and no on could've surprised him more. He could've gotten used to one or the other, but to have them both in the same body, the same bundle of contradictions that was Curly, surprised him no end.

　

　

　

　


	11. Chapter 11

　

Chapter eleven

　

　

The next time they were in port together for a brief, twelve-hour liberty, Curly took him under his wing, promising to show him all the sights. But Hutch colored up and his voice got high and awkward. He wouldn’t go to a brothel when Curly tried to push, and when they ate the spicy, jerked chicken for sale by the docks, he got sick. And when he waited for Curly in a bar, sipping his drink, he ended up caught in the middle of someone’s bar fight.

He got a punch on the nose and spent the rest of the evening with his head tilted back, holding his nose with a handkerchief. On the way back to the ship, he tripped and fell in the mud because he couldn’t see where he was going.

Curly, half exasperated, half fond, plucked him up and hauled him back to the ship, broken, bruised, and quite miserable after his first liberty. He promised Hutch would enjoy next liberty more; perhaps they’d go to a market or a fair something he’d like, and no more bar fights, or bad chicken, or tripping in the mud.

"I said, d’you like roast chicken?"

"Not anymore."

"I mean, when it’s done _right_."

"I used to! I don’t think I do anymore. I didn’t like getting sick on it."

"Well, you won’t get sick next time. We’ll make sure they’ve burnt it good, and not spiced it too hard, neither."

"I don’t see why you like chicken so much. You’re always hugging them."

"That’s different. They’re friends. I don’t know these other chickens."

"So if I wasn’t your friend, you’d eat me?"

"You got a sick mind, you know that? Hey, wanna race me to the ship?"

Hutch made a face. "You always win."

"That’s true. Why do you think I wanna race?"

"Well, why don’t you just declare yourself the winner and I’ll follow at my own pace?"

"Because your own pace will take half a year—and anyway, how d’you expect to get any faster if you don’t practice? Maybe someday you’ll beat me."

"Yeah—with a stick!"

"See ya try." Starsky pulled him after him, grinning, then let go and started for the rigging at a run. "Race ya! Race ya!"

When they got there, something was different. There was a strange air of expectancy on the ship, a barely suppressed excitement. The men who had returned seemed to be making an effort to spruce themselves up and appear at their best. They kept whispering to every new crewman who returned so the excitement seemed to spread, with men straightening their shirts, smoothing their beards, fixing their caps.

"What is it?" Starsky walked up to Dobey, and Hutch followed him.

The big black man glanced at them and frowned. "Girl on board," he observed. "Hmph. Lot of foolishness if you ask me."

"A girl?" Starsky perked up. "What kind of girl? Somebody’s wife? Or, uh, you know—"

Dobey frowned at him. "You’re not too big to whip, boy."

"Aw, Dobey you’d never…"

"I have and I will again if need be! The girl’s a passenger. She and her father were stuck on this island, left by their last boat with no return passage home. The captain’s seen fit to take them, but that’s no need to carry on, and I don’t want to see you both starting, too."

"But where is she?" Starsky looked around, craning his neck.

"Starsky!"

Of course, his words did little good when they actually saw her. Hutch found himself standing taller, puffing his chest out, wanting to look strong and worth her attention and notice. When he glanced over at Curly, his friend seemed to be similarly engaged, wearing a big smile, obviously enchanted by the girl before them.

She had a wholesome prettiness about her, a look of clean air and fresh milk and lots of sunshine. She hadn’t been wholly shielded from the sun as most of the girls Hutch had ever known. Freckles actually dappled her face. She wore a trim dress, white gloves, little black boots, and a small straw hat.

Hutch found his eyes, as the rest of the eyes of the crew, followed her with avid abandon. He was only vaguely aware of her father, a dim blur in a dark suit by her side, discontented looking and with graying whiskers. The pair was announced to the crew as Mr. Henry Fellows and his daughter Henrietta, and then removed to take up residence in their quarters. Fellows was to share a room with Wilbur, Hutch’s old place, while the girl got her own cabin, the rest of the crew being shuffled around to make room for her.

After that, every day held the excitement of Henrietta. Hutch woke up in the morning thinking about her and went to sleep at night pondering her. She rarely left his thoughts. The most perfect, beautiful girl in the world. Because she had smiled at the crew and nodded at the introduction, each man aboard seemed to think—or perhaps simply wished to think—that the smile could’ve been meant for him.

She strolled the deck for part of each day or sat on a little chair Wilbur fetched for her and took the sun. Sometimes she read from a little book or sketched in her tablet. (She drew! They had something in common!) But more often she simply watched the sea and the ship’s passage and the work the men did.

She had an admirable curiosity and found no man unwilling to answer her questions about shipboard life. She’d have been the belle of all their hearts with much less than the charm and interest she showed, making each man feel special with a smile or a nod when he stumbled over himself to help her with a seat, or fetched her a handkerchief which had blown away, or any number of other things. If she did smile at or talk to any man, it earned him the bitter jealousy of his fellows, until it was their turn.

One day she looked at Hutch with the faintest laughter in her eyes, as if to communicate something to him, and suddenly her handkerchief fluttered away. He stumbled all over himself to get it for her before someone else could, and then he was standing there, his heart pounding like mad, wanting to talk to her and having nothing, absolutely nothing to say.

She looked up at him, like the most perfect princess who had ever lived. "I believe I heard that you draw?"

He nodded, dumb-struck and wordless.

She smiled daintily. "Perhaps you would show me something? I’ve never seen any nautical drawings before."

"Oh—they’re—they’re not…" he stumbled. "I’ll get them now." He turned and abruptly ran from the deck, and fetched his book, and spent the next ten minutes of his life deliriously happy while she looked through his cherished book, commenting here and there, and particularly admiring his dolphins.

He tripped twice that day, and walked around with a happy little smile on his face. They would get married. They would raise eight children together, and horses.

After that, he got to speak to her every day; she worked it out, even going so far as to address him as Mr. Hutchinson, and asking if he would mind showing her the sails—a terrible request, as he was not always completely sure of them himself, especially the littler ones.

His infamy spread abroad with this. It was hard not to begrudge his good fortune, however much the two seemed to have in common, and the sailors cast him unpleasant glances over his favored status. But Hutch was a young gentleman, even if he was a common sailor at the moment; the friendship was allowed to continue.

Starsky, for all his admiration of Henrietta, made no excuse to get near her in the hopes of her dropping something, as many of the men did, vying for spots downwind. In fact, for all his admiration, he seemed to hold his head down and keep to himself as much as Dobey or the older, much-scarred cook did.

"Oh dear, there goes that young man with the eye-patch again," she said one day to Hutch. "It makes him look so terrible and fierce and unpleasant."

Curly was hurrying past with his head down, trying to keep it averted. But he had his orders, and needed to do his job.

Hutch looked at him, and now he understood. Curly felt ugly. It shocked him, because Starsky could never be ugly to him.

"Oh, my dear Henrietta, he’s not at all terrible, fierce, or unpleasant. He is my dearest friend. Did you know he received those scars saving my life?" And, with more clarity than he could usually manage in his words to her, he told her the whole tale, leaving out the gory bits, but making Starsky seem utterly heroic, as indeed he had been.

By the time he was done, she was looking in Curly’s direction with an entirely new expression. "I think I must meet this paragon of virtue."

Hutch smiled. "I’ll fetch him." He went over to Curly, waited until he was free, and hooked an arm through his.

"Where are you—what are you—" Curly tried to pull away. "No, Hutch," he said in a desperate undertone.

"She wants to meet you, my dear," Hutch whispered. Indeed, she was smiling encouragingly at them; and when Curly came over, she put him at ease without much difficulty by asking him about various sails and bits of the ship.

"Oh, are you certain?" she asked with a concerned frown when Curly pointed out a sail in the ship’s front and named it the fore topmast staysail. "Ken said it was the flying jib."

Curly by now was so at ease he laughed aloud at this. "Well, _Ken_ has been known to get things wrong sometimes. He’s only been a sailor a few months himself, you know."

Hutch’s ears started burning, as they both turned amused, rather tolerant expressions on him. He excused himself stiffly. "Oh dear," he heard Henrietta whisper as he walked away, "I think we may have hurt his feelings."

After that, she continued to talk to both of them, more often than not separately. Curly talked at ease with her now, even more so than Hutch did, and he walked with a bounce in his step, a cocky confidence. Often a little smile playing about his lip. Hutch watched them jealously, trying not to eavesdrop, and yet wanting desperately to do so.

The captain kept an eye on things, and her father, but neither completely discouraged the attentions. After all, all three were approximately the same age. Only, at sixteen, Henrietta was quite ready to be married, while the boys were still poor sailors; they had no real hope, and so no one took them seriously. Wilbur was also seen to spend more time with her than Hutch quite liked, and his intentions were taken quite seriously. As a midshipman with hope of passing his lieutenant’s exam this year, and the connections that might someday bring him his own ship, he was a decent prospect. And he was a little older. Hutch couldn’t watch her talking seriously to him and nodding without feeling an intense dislike for the stiff-backed, moustache-stroking Wilbur.

On the days when they had music, chairs were brought up for the Fellowes, and the music was kept to that more suitable for a lady’s ears. When it was Hutch’s turn to sing, Danny Boy again, he was so nervous his voice squeaked on the first few notes. Only by closing his eyes and concentrating very hard on the music was he able to finish at all appropriately. By the end, he finished strong, and he opened his eyes in surprise to see everyone clapping, Henrietta hardest of all, rising from her chair, eyes shining.

After this he seemed to become the favorite, and he saw Curly watching them talk sometimes, expressionless, and then go back to work quickly. And sometimes Wilbur looked at him with such hate.

It did not happen all at once, nor deliberately, but somehow or other Hutch and Curly found themselves in rivalry. At first, Hen’s presence did not impede their friendship at all; in fact, they occasionally talked about her: what they’d heard about her father’s plans for her, and the area she’d lived, and what her hobbies were. But as the issue became one of contention and their interests grew more fevered and serious, the subject never came up; nor did many others. They spent less time together, and there was a stiffness between them when they did.

He wanted his hair to be neat more than ever now, but somehow he liked to ask Starsky for help less than ever. He tried fixing it himself, but proved unable to make anything but a lopsided braid that hemorrhaged loose hair. Starsky’s stiffness went so far that he stopped asking Hutch to sing, and rarely talked to him. Hutch got Dobey to help him with straightening his hair and making it presentable, as he still proved unable to master the art of making a plait of his own hair. He kept himself as neat as he possibly could, even rather obsessively straightening his shirt and trying to keep his cuffs flat and clean, to the point when he spilled stew on himself one day, and the whole mess burst into laughter at his dismayed expression. But Starsky was the first.

"Lookit him, Mr. Prissy Neat-pants himself!" said Curly, pointing at him.

Hostilities increased. Hutch walked past him after the meal and shoved a shoulder against him, hard.

Curly took the blow and then nimbly sidestepped to give him a narrow-eyed look. "Better watch it, soldier. I think a breeze passed by here or something. Something light and delicate."

Hutch flushed to his roots, gritting his teeth in rage, and kept stiffly silent. He couldn’t strike Curly, though he wanted to, and his mind was blank of any suitable return insults.

But they came to him.

They came to him the evening he saw Curly and Henrietta on deck together, and Curly bend over her hand elaborately, and planted a kiss on her hand. A lingering kiss, on the back of her bare hand.

Hutch flushed scarlet, and went cold, and stood trembling in the shadows, clenching and unclenching his fists, until their smiling and talking was done—and their hands finished brushing each other, he noticed. Oh, but they were good at that! You didn’t even see if you didn’t look closely…

He was waiting in the shadows when Curly walked away, whistling, with a bounce in his step. Hutch caught Starsky’s shoulder and yanked him after him, belowdecks, to the rat-infested, squeaking bowels of the ship. "You. Me. We’re talking," he grated in a hoarse voice.

"About what? You losing?" smirked Curly.

Hutch plowed into him, smacking a fist against his jaw and making him stumble back. Starsky came back at him with a fierceness and intensity that surprised even the furious Hutch.

They fought—actually fought each other.

Hutch got in a few good blows, but he’d never been in a real brawl before, only a couple tussles when he was much younger, and Starsky obviously had a lot of experience. In a moment, Starsky had clipped him one on the ribs and shoulder and had him pinned gasping against a beam of the ship, wood splintering into his back.

"Try that again, tough guy," said Starsky in a deceptively low, calm voice.

"Ugh! Lemme go! She could never love you. Her little finger has more b-brains than you have in your whole head!"

"Yeah? Well maybe she doesn’t care so much about brains." Starsky chuffed softly into Hutch’s face, his breath smelling of the herb he’d chewed to sweeten his breath, partially masking the fish he’d eaten at the last meal.

Hutch struggled harder against the hands, but Starsky had him pinned easily. "You stuck up, hairy loser!"

Starsky’s hands tightened momentarily, painfully, but his tone didn’t change. "Yeah? Looks to me like I’m winning. You’re just a sore loser." He shoved a knee forward, pinning Hutch more thoroughly by the thigh. Now all he could do was gasp—and talk.

"You didn’t win! You can’t win. You’d probably give her syphilis. You’re so disgusting she probably has to squint when she looks at you. Y-you’re an ugly, scarred monkey, and nobody could ever love you!"

Now Starsky was breathing hard into Hutch’s face, his teeth gleaming and fierce. "Yeah? Well, maybe I am. But you wanna know why she likes you? Because you’re the closest thing there is to another girl onboard. You’re hairless and weak and no girl could ever be interested in you." Then he released him and Hutch stumbled forward, tried to take off after him again, but Starsky was too fast, and in a moment, he was gone.

Hutch stood there, panting furiously. He started up, but when he got to the deck, Starsky was nowhere to be seen; he couldn’t continue the fight even though he wanted to.

Trembling, he went to his hammock and dug out the gifts Starsky had given him—a piece of scrimshaw, etched with the shape of a ship, and a few small, carved wooden animals. He stomped the animals underfoot until they broke, and shoved them into Starsky’s folded hammock so he’d find them when he went to hang it up at night; and the scrimshaw—which he’d loved, rubbing the intricate design endlessly, he took to the galley and tried to throw into the fire.

He would’ve done it, too, except the cook caught him and wrestled it away, and put it on a top shelf and wouldn’t let Hutch get past him to pull it down again. "You don’t throw away a piece like that. That’s valuable, that is."

Hutch went away again, filled with an impotent, hopeless rage. He climbed the rigging, halfway hoping to find Curly crouched in the crow’s nest so he could go at him again with his fists, and maybe succeed better this time.

But he was alone, and he stared at sea, and only here, after quite some time, did he begin to calm down. And then he began to cry.

He’d been an idiot. She’d never been interested in him. The eight children and the horses and marriage dissolved into the shameful dream of a fool. What a child he’d been!

But when she smiled…when she talked to him, it had seemed…

It was clear now, though. If she liked Curly just as well or better, why, then, it had all been his imagination—or she was playing with him. That was so much worse he could not contemplate it.

And Curly. He’d said horrible things to Curly, and Curly had called him a girl.

He put his head down on his knees and wept, at the loss of everything he’d come to care about left in this life.

　

　

　

　


	12. Chapter 12

　

　

Chapter twelve

　

　

He and Curly were sullen all through the next day, not talking to each other. Curly, in revenge for his crushed animals, had taken the cheat-sheets for spelling and the drawings Hutch had given him and, quite calmly during the meal, got up and pulled them out, then moved towards the brazier and stuffed them in. The flames jumped momentarily higher, and Hutch had stopped chewing a moment, a fist squeezing around his heart.

Curly rather defiantly still went to spend time with Henrietta. Hutch stayed back, doing his best to ignore them talking and even laughing together. How could Curly laugh? Hutch guessed he didn’t feel the same way, like the bottom had been kicked out of his life. Well, he certainly wasn’t going to be the only one who cared. He wasn’t going to be a _girl_ about it.

But later, Henrietta called him over ("Ken. Ken!"), and he couldn’t resist. He walked over to her, keeping his head down, almost not caring that he looked like he was pouting.

"What’s the matter?" She caught his chin and tilted it back, a surprisingly familiar gesture that would’ve sent him into transports of delight two days ago. "Why, have you been crying?"

"No. I don’t cry."

She smiled at him suddenly. "I’d hate to think you and your _best friend_ are fighting over _me_." Her voice didn’t quite match her words, but he couldn’t sort it out.

"You like him better," he said sullenly.

"I most certainly do not. Dave is…well, he’s a lot of fun. But he’s not educated, he’s not anywhere near the gentleman and altogether accomplished fellow you are." She was holding his hand now, stroking the back of it, sending little shivers of fire and ice all through his body, turning his insides soft as a pudding.

"You—you don’t like him better?"

She smiled, tilting her head. "Ken. I’m not just anyone, you know. I come from a good family, like you do. Oh, if I was just a common girl, I suppose Dave would be good enough. But even so he can’t sing like you, and he has that unsightly scar—"

"He’s not unsightly." Hutch found himself defending Curly instantly, even though he’d said that and much worse only last night to Curly’s face. But somehow, hearing it behind his friend’s back, and after she’d been so friendly with Starsky, too, seemed like a stab of betrayal, a kick in the gut, and he reacted to it instinctively. "Don’t talk about him like that."

"But Ken, why not? It’s all over the ship. You two are fighting about me, and I just wanted you to know the truth, so you wouldn’t worry." She was looking up at him with wide brown eyes, and now Hutch recognized the spark of something he saw in them. It was enjoyment. She was enjoying this. Enjoying seeing Hutch get his heart ripped out, and fighting with his best friend in the world.

"E-excuse me." He tugged his hand free. He turned and got away from there as quickly as he could.

That night in his hammock, he wept. He’d lost the girl he’d thought he loved, the girl who wasn’t really there. And he’d lost Curly, the only person in the world who’d been willing to die for him, who’d been his nearest and dearest friend, since Huggy was gone. He’d lost Curly’s big smile, and Curly’s jokes, and he’d crushed his wooden animals in a fit of rage. And now he had nothing, nothing at all but two big holes in his heart, hemorrhaging hurt, and it felt like they would never heal.

#

The next day, he walked up to Curly stiffly while he was coiling ropes on the deck. People worked within earshot. Curly pretended not to see him. He sat coiling diligently, as if it took all his attention and then some. Hutch felt curious gazes on him, but there was no helping it. He’d never get Curly to come away so he could apologize privately. So instead he just said it.

"I’m sorry. I was wrong." He waited a moment, not really expecting anything. It felt like a butterfly was trapped in his chest, beating its wings around and knocking into all his organs, terrifying them even though it was just a weak little thing, halfway dying. He stood there a moment and watched Curly coil, and then he turned stiffly and left, walking just a little too fast.

The next day, Curly brought one of his drawings, a dolphin playing in the ocean, and plopped it down in front of him at the table. "I forgot to burn that one. I thought you might want it back."

Hutch looked up at Curly from his meal, from the picture (slightly grubby around the edges, where Curly had held it to look at it), and met Curly’s eyes. They were still a cold, implacable blue. "Thanks," said Hutch in a very gruff voice. He left it sitting there.

"Well, if you don’t want it, I can still go ahead and burn it."

"Go ahead. I don’t care." He turned back to his burgoo.

"I will. See if I don’t."

But he just stood there, and after a moment sat down, not as close as he’d have sat if they weren’t fighting, but still nearby, and began to eat as well, bending over his food and shoving it down hurriedly. He always did eat like the ship was on fire and the only way to put it out was eat everything in sight, very fast.

Curly and Henrietta still saw each other, and sometimes he heard them laughing. The sound pierced him to his soul. Were they laughing at him? He’d loved both their laughter so, so much, and now none of it was for him, never again. Henrietta could call Curly things behind his back and the next day laugh with him as if he were the most wonderful man in the world. Things could never be the same between Hutch and her, never ever. But he’d lost Starsky, too, and there seemed to be no fixing that.

#

"I didn’t mean what I said, you know." Curly spoke in a strained, quiet voice, sounding as if he meant to be casual. They were coiling ropes together on the deck, assigned there together by the lieutenant, perhaps in the hopes of healing the breach. At first, their fight had been a nudging and laughing matter among the crew: _Curly and Hairless parting ways, haw haw, see how long that lasts_. But it had ceased to be a source of humor and begun to take its toll on the ship, weighing down the mood where before there had been laughter, and silliness, and two boys in good cheer to keep the company in stitches.

"Me neither," said Hutch, keeping his head down, and coiling diligently. He still couldn’t look at Curly without it hurting; and he didn’t want to see implacable blues eyes. Curly was probably forcing himself to utter this apology.

"It was just something to say. I said the meanest, worst thing I could think of. I wanted to hurt you."

Well, it worked.

"Me too," said Hutch.

"You gonna just parrot everything I say?" Curly sounded frustrated.

Hutch shook his head quickly. "No."

"Good. I’m trying to ‘pologize. I know I’m ugly and…and everything, but I don’t really think you’re like a girl. Not at all. I just said it—well, to be, to be mean. Because I was upset."

"You’re not ugly, Curly."

"Hutch…" Curly had a warning note in his voice, and he held up a hand. Hutch fell silent. "Now, I’m willin’ to let bygones be bygones and I hope you are too. No hard feelings?"

"No hard feelings." Hutch grinned in relief.

Curly gave him a slightly scolding look for using his same phrase; but Hutch stuck out a hand and gave him a big smile. Starsky returned it a little ruefully. His handshake was a firm, warm grasp. His smile widened a little bit, reluctantly when he saw how happy and relieved Hutch looked. "Well. I’m glad that’s over," he mumbled. "Now can I ask ya somethin’?"

"Anything, Curly. You know that."

Curly’s brows rose as if a bit sarcastic or doubting, but he just went ahead and asked, getting a slightly embarrassed look on his face. "I know it ain’t probably proper, but there’s no one else I’d rather have by my side. So what I’m asking is, can ya put aside the fact that you lost, long enough to be my best man?" He scratched at his hair, head tilted a little, looking pleased and shy.

Hutch felt all the blood drain from his face. "She’s not…?"

Curly nodded happily. "She’s gonna convince her dad tonight, and tomorrow we’ll tell the captain!" He looked so happy Hutch felt more miserable still.

Well, perhaps he was wrong. Perhaps she really did like Curly, and she’d only talked about him like that because…because…because why? Was there any excuse good enough?

"Starsky, I can’t," said Hutch very gently. "I think it’s a mistake."

Curly flushed to the roots of his hair. He turned away stiffly. "Well, if that’s how it is." He crossed his arms. "Fine. Be that way."

"Starsk, you don’t understand." He stepped forward, keeping his voice quiet and gentle. "I just…I don’t think she’s good enough for you."

"Good enough for me? What the—" He turned his fiercest glower on Hutch. "Oh, I see how it is. First I’m a monkey, and now she’s not good enough for me? So, just what are you sayin’ about Henrietta, huh? You think she’s dirt because you didn’t get her? I oughta knock your block off. I oughta call you out, only I forgot, I’m not ‘gennelman’ enough."

"Starsk, please." Hutch backed away, holding his hands up, waving his hands. "Please stop." He was flushing scarlet, and heads were turning on deck at the sound of Starsky’s raised voice. "Please don’t do this."

"You did it. You started it, buddy." He grabbed Hutch by the shirt and yanked him forward, glowering into his face. It was far more intimidating, here on deck where he could properly see Starsky’s wrath, and now that he had none of his own to meet it with, only a sinking feeling in his gut, a miserable feeling.

Starsky spoke through clenched teeth, shaking him. "How dare you say anything about—"

"You there! That’ll be enough!" yelled the bosun, starting forward, pointing at Starsky.

Starsky released Hutch at once and took a step back. He looked Hutch up and down with a curl of his lip. "We’re finished. You and me—we’re through." He stalked away.

Hutch stared after him miserably. So close. They’d been friends again for almost a whole minute.

Across the deck, he suddenly saw Henrietta, watching. Was it his imagination, or did she look pleased?

#

He cried a little that night, trying not to, but crying anyway, silently in the privacy of his own hammock. He kept rolling around, trying to get comfortable. Curly wasn’t anywhere nearby, of course, so he wouldn’t have to hear Hutch’s hiccups, wouldn’t have to know what they meant.

Dobey had stayed, though. Now he poked at Hutch’s hammock. "Settle down and go to sleep," he growled.

Hutch bit his lip. "I c-can’t. He’s gonna m—"

"Shut your pie hole," growled Dobey, very quietly, and then more softly, "These things have a way of working themselves out. You go to sleep now, boy."

Hutch tried, but it was hard. He dreamed all night of Curly and Hen getting married, standing proudly on the deck, Starsky with his chest puffed out, not noticing the evil smirk on Hen’s face, or the dismissive look she gave him, curling her lip when he wasn’t noticing. It was such a vivid dream, and it kept repeating, and then there was something about pirates, and sea-monsters, and the pirates fought the sea monsters and won, for the right to come kill everyone aboard.

He thrashed around in his hammock, trying to wake up.

Someone pulled down the edge of his hammock to help him get down. He pulled it too fast, and Hutch almost spilled out. He kept his balance only by hanging on with both hands.

"Get up," Starsky growled, glaring down at Hutch. "You’re gonna watch it."

Hutch scrambled, and managed to get on his feet. Starsky gave him a hateful look, then caught him by the arm. "C’mon. You’re presentable enough."

Hutch stumbled on deck, rubbing his eyes. Sure enough, people were assembled, lined up, looking scrubbed and solemn.

Then they stopped. Henrietta stood at the front, by the acting-captain (his book open, ready for marrying), her father by her side, looking grim: and there, in the spot of the groom, Wilbur.

Starsky released Hutch’s elbow and started forward. "Excuse me. I’m the groom."

Everyone stared at him as if he’d gone insane. Hen, her face stiff and icy, spoke. "Do I have to listen to this at my wedding?"

The captain said, "You most certainly do not. Bosun—" He pointed.

Hutch grabbed Starsky’s arm. Davey was just standing there, looking lost. "C’mon, Starsk." Hutch tugged him back. "C’mon Curly. Let’s go below for now."

He’d have liked it better if Starsky would yell, or hit something, but he just stared. Above them, the ship was so quiet they could hear the ropes creak and the captain reading the marriage ceremony in a fine, grim voice.

Starsky stood motionless, looking wretched.

"Sit down," suggested Hutch, touching his arm gently. Starsky obeyed. He sat down on the floor looking like a little lost boy. After a moment, Hutch sat down beside him, legs stretched out, mirroring his posture. He wanted to put an arm around him and promise it would be all right. Somehow, he didn’t quite dare. He just sat next to him in quiet support.

After a while, Starsky stirred. "You knew, didn’t you?"

Hutch laid a hand on Starsky’s leg, wishing he knew what to say. It would get better? Only time would prove that now, not platitudes.

Starsky shook his head. "You knew."

Then he got up, hung up his hammock again, and climbed in. He didn’t come out for a while.

　

　


	13. Chapter 13

　

Chapter thirteen

　

　

　

Starsky was like a ghost. He moved around as if in a dream, seeming not to notice. He almost got a whipping once for disobedience, but Hutch got there in time, pushed him into the right job and helped him get started with it.

Hutch looked after Starsky for those days, making him sit down, putting hardtack in his hand, and his spoon for stew, waiting until he began to eat, not just stare at it, before he’d begin to eat his own. He kept Starsky by him most of the time, and looked out for him whenever possible. Dobey covered the rest. Curly was a broken man—not even aware of Wilbur’s wrathful, strutting indignation.

"She must have told all of us she liked him best, then just picked one at the end," said Starsky one day abruptly.

Hutch looked at him quickly; it was the first time Starsky had spoken on his own in days. He replied quietly, so as not to scare him silent again. "Well, Wilbur certainly has the best prospects. He’s to inherit quite a lot, and he may have his own ship someday."

Starsky shook his head, retreating again into silence.

"What I mean is, it’s probably nothing personal. She probably picked for—for reasons entirely other than feelings."

Starsky just turned away again, not speaking for the rest of the day.

Hutch wanted to fix it, but he felt incurably awkward. Gone was their intimate, laughing friendship, and Starsky was tomb-like in his grief and silence. Hutch looked after him, but almost didn’t dare try to cheer him up.

As long as the newly married couple was on the ship, Starsky kept his face down, stayed humiliated and invisible. There was not so much teasing as you would have expected; by now most of the crew understood Hen better than she probably would have liked, and only a few who cordially disliked Starsky made remarks. As he completely ignored these, they soon died away.

Now she and Wilbur shared a cabin. Hutch wondered sometimes if the Fellowes had taken their voyage simply to catch her a husband with prospects; for, it had spread amongst the crew that they were really much poorer than they had at first appeared; shabby genteel, down on their luck. The ship on which they’d originally taken their passage had a great many more prospects, only they had been left ashore for causing too much contention among the crew. It was probably just an ugly rumor; but all the same, he shared it with Starsky, feeling rather ashamed for passing on gossip. Curly did not, of course, react. He wasn't saying much lately.

But Hen could still cut him to the quick with the haughty ways she would ignore them, or, worse, the laughing way she’d look at them. It kept Starsky in a constant state of misery. Now Wilbur became even more rotten, cracking down on Starsky and Hutch, often unfairly, always harshly. He twice nearly found an excuse to have Curly whipped, but fortunately the lieutenant saw through his motives and dismissed the charges.

The third time he was unable to do so, and this time, Hutch was the one to beg and barter for laudanum (which Curly nearly refused, but finally took. ("It's quite an unfair punishment, so why should you be forced to feel its full wrath?")

And Hutch was the one forced to stand and watch. He squeezed his nails into his palms until they bled. He snuck away to see his friend in sickbay while he recovered. Curly seemed miserable enough to cry, but of course he would not.

Hutch sat by him, not knowing what to say. But when they were alone, he talked to him and smoothed his hair back, and once even sang to him, part of Danny Boy, awkward and low, his voice cracking on some of the notes. Curly reached up and took his arm when he finished, gave it a brief squeeze. Then he put his head back down, and continued to lie in silence. He hadn't spoken in over twelve hours.

"Someday I'll get you off this heap," said Hutch conversationally. "And no bastards will be able to beat us around like this."

#

They sat in the crow's nest one evening, not talking.

"Please say something. You could at least talk to me once in a while," said Hutch.

"What is there to talk about?"

"Don't let her ruin your life. She's not worth it."

Starsky shrugged.

"Would you--would you just quit pining? She's a terrible person or she'd never have treated you like that. You're lucky she didn't marry you or you'd be stuck with her now forever. Why do you think Wilbur's being such a jerk? He's probably finding out what she's like. Please, Starsky. Just come back, all right?"

Starsky turned to stare at him. "I've never heard you talk like that."

"Well, I'm running out of options. I don't know how to get through to you anymore. I thought you were gonna forgive me, huh? Do you have to shut me out, too? Should I pretend to be deaf again so you can tell me your secrets?"

Starsky stared at him. "Hutch, I just don't have anything to say. I don't have any words left inside me."

"Would you--would you find some? You used to talk constantly." Hutch choked the words past his tight throat.

Starsky tilted his head slightly, then nodded. "I got one thing. Let's never fight again, all right?"

"Oh, I'm with you there, brother. ...You, uh, do know it was just words, right? Just hurtful words, and I didn't mean a single one. And I wish to heaven I'd never broken your carvings. They were some of the nicest things..." After a moment, he added, "At least I didn't burn your scrimshaw."

"Oh?" Curly's arm slid around his shoulder, warm and comfortable. "Why not?"

"Well, the cook stopped me. But I'm glad he did."

"Well, I only kept that one drawing of yours. I was kinda glad to get rid of your spelling sheets. What do you think this is, a floating school?"

"More education can only help you in life," said Hutch sententiously. Then he laughed. "All right--well, I suppose you were just looking for an excuse, for those. I wish I hadn't stomped the ducks and chickens, though."

"I'll carve you a dolphin. You won't dare stomp that!" He rested his chin on Hutch's shoulder.

#

After that, Curly began to act more like himself again. He seemed to awake a bit, and he would sometimes even raise his head and look at the sky, or gaze out at sea without looking like he wanted to dive into it and not come back.

He had a naturally rolling, buoyant gait; it seemed to return somewhat, along with his appetite. Hutch was so glad to have him back he didn’t hide his affection as much as he normally would’ve. He’d take a swipe at Curly’s hair, and smile at him, sit next to him at a meal if they were allowed to eat at the same time, close enough they were shoulder to shoulder. He’d sit next to him at the music times and even lean against his shoulder if he grew tired. Curly was once again becoming the sturdy presence he’d missed so.

Unfortunately, this led to jokes amongst the crew—the sweethearts were back together. And Henrietta seemed to notice, as well. Whatever her motive, she began to make eyes at the boys again—one or both of them, whoever was available. It was a disgraceful display in Hutch’s eyes—he flushed to his roots when she gave him a steamy look—but it didn’t matter how he and Curly reacted (very properly, staying away, keeping their gazes down), because Wilbur saw what his wife was doing, and must have blamed them; he grew furious, and life grew worse onboard ship again.

Wilbur seemed to get angrier and grumpier the longer he was married; perhaps he really did regret his decision. If he did, though, the way he showed it was by taking his frustrations out on everyone else; he became nearly unbearable, until it was the case that Hutch occasionally overheard sailors muttering darkly about him, or exchanging rather evil-looking, meaningful glances.

He wondered if this was the way a ship felt when mutiny was underfoot. Then he told himself it was just his imagination; he’d always had too much of one.

#

Captain Marley (who had been sick all this time), began to grow a little better. He was bundled miserable and hunched on deck to take the sun, in several blankets. He had to be lowered with great care, and was obviously fighting queasiness every moment, his eyes horribly puffy and squinted shut against the daylight.

Hutch found himself quite disturbed by the sight; it reminded him oddly of how his grandfather had seemed to waste away, before his time came. Seeing the captain so gave him the same shivery, scared feeling, as if he were very close to seeing something no one living should—Death itself, as if, if you got too close, the Grim Reaper would look over his shoulder, spot you instead, and you’d be gone.

He was glad enough the rules bade him and the rest of the sailors stay far away from the captain, before the mast.

Captain Marley did not give many orders. Nor did he interfere in any way with the growingly troubling dynamics on board. The lieutenant, working too hard, and growing testier and testier, began to grow harsher in his demands--and his punishments.

Once again, extra work was doled out, the men kept on short leashes and with little energy for their music, or to relax and tell tales. They fell into their hammocks at the end of each watch (or each double watch!) exhausted and instantly asleep.

A sailor, Hutch had learned, could sleep anywhere. Perhaps he was becoming a real one, after all; one day he fell asleep making rope. The man next to him had to nudge him awake.

But if the men weren’t allowed to bother the captain, the captain had no such qualms about them. When he was up for it, he always noticed some fault, real or imagined, and growled at someone to make the men shape up and do it over, or mete out harsh punishments that were their ‘due.’

Hutch grew to hate the sound of his grizzly old voice, the querulous irritable sound of it rising to scold someone or order someone beaten with a rope (one of the lightest punishments, indeed).

The men seemed to grow sullener by the day. Hutch felt it growing in himself, as well--the feeling that dare not be named: mutiny.

He tried to talk to Starsky about it one day, when they were loading below decks. "Curly, if it comes down to it--"

"Down to what?" Curly gave him a flinty stare, doubly effective, somehow, with only one eye.

Something about his expression made Hutch gulp and back off. "Um--just talking. Ju-just wondering…"

"Well don’t. We don’t even wonder about that kinda thing." His look was very stern indeed.

Hutch shut up, wondering how in the world Curly had known what he was going to start talking about, before he’d even got one word out.

Later, in the rigging, where the wind whipped away their words, they held a quiet, whispered conference. Curly touched his side. "I know you don’t mean no harm, Hutch, but I won’t have you talkin’ like that. I don’t care what anybody else is sayin’, you don’t utter a word." He gave him a speaking look, less stern but just as intense as earlier. "I don’t wanna see you hangin’ from the yardarm, and that’s what happens to--to you know."

Hutch’s eyes opened wider, and he swallowed. He leaned closer, lowering his voice further yet. "Just to be clear--we’re talking about mutiny."

"Shh!" Starsky looked around wildly, as if afraid to find a seagull spying on them.

"No one can hear us," said Hutch, and continued on, quickly. "And you’re saying if it comes to that, we side with the captain." He got it out in a rush, before Curly could shush him further.

The hand coming out to cover his mouth drew back, and Curly stared at him. "Yes, of course that’s what I’m sayin’."

"But they treat us so--"

"Hutch," said Curly in a calm voice, as if he were explaining something perfectly evident, to a rather small child. "Do you know what kinda life pirates have? Even if they’re not caught and hung? It’s run, run, run--and then you gotta hang out with pirates, and they’re crueler than we can imagine, worse than anyone on God’s blue or green earth. I’d rather get an unfair whippin’ any day than be hung, or watch you get hung, or end up a mutineer pirate seadog."

Hutch stared at him. "So there is something you’re afraid of," he said quietly.

Curly stared back. His voice was quiet, almost hoarse. "Yeah. Didn’t you know? Lots of things." His one-eyed gaze looked somber.

Partly Hutch wanted to ask, but somehow he did not quite dare. He had the rotten feeling he was part of the worry, one of the things that made Curly wear that haunted look of concern. Starsky wasn’t really a carefree kid, was he? Perhaps he never had been, and it had been a show all along…

Hutch reached out and squeezed his arm. "Don’t worry, Curly. We’ll be all right. I’ll look after you."

"Yeah. You look after yourself. Keep that bright head of yours down. Ah, Hutch--I wish you didn’t stand out so much! When they want someone to pick on, it just seems like you’re always there, young and clumsy and with that hair, shining like a torch."

Hutch drew back, smiling defensively. "I’m getting lots better."

Curly touched his side and looked at him with gentle, but slightly laughing eyes. "Hutch, you’re not a born sailor, and you never will be. Now I love ya anyway, I just don’t care. But you stick out. You gotta admit, you stick out. Would you promise to keep your head down, and try not to stick out?"

Hutch stretched his face into a smile, although it kind of hurt. "I could rub soot into my hair."

"Good idea! Now see, you can do it when you try!"

He looked so happy at the feeble suggestion. Hutch didn’t know what else to say, and he felt rather odd now. He’d thought he was fitting in better. He really had. Perhaps it was a sign he’d been at sea too long that he wanted to fit in; after all, he’d never wanted to be a sailor before he got shipped out.

But this ship had become his home, his only home, dysfunctional or not.

　

　

　

　


	14. Chapter 14

　

Chapter fourteen

　

Curly always seemed to know what was going on first. But all the same, it was a shock to realize for certain that the growing dissatisfaction was something more.

Wilbur’s wrath, the captain’s harangues, the lieutenant’s sternness …and Henrietta, fomenting and tormenting with each tilt of her head, each swish of her skirt, torturing the men or turning cold shoulders when she wished, and driving Wilbur even further into his fury. He curbed himself somewhat when the lieutenant was around; was it possible the lieutenant remained ignorant? Or more likely, did he not care?

But indeed he did not. That Sunday, he gave a fierce speech about duty and punishment, a harsh warning about any who would mutiny, disobey, or drag their feet. The man stirred nervously, exchanging low looks. They were brought quickly back to attention.

And so Hutch began to learn what it was to sail on a harsh ship. Busy work kept the men occupied, kept them exhausted. Three men were thrown in the brig for whispering together; several others were whipped for minor offenses. Dobey, Hutch, and Starsky did not even dare be seen together anymore.

So they learned to communicate without words. A look across deck spoke solidarity in silence, understanding, a commitment to patience and keeping their heads down together.

All the same, this proved difficult. The two youngest men on the ship stood out so easily (Curly had been right), especially with Wilbur’s hatred thrown in the midst.

Starsky took to hiding from time to time in his bolt-hole, creeping away for moments just to be alone, to breathe. Hutch was careful never to disappear at the same time; one boy missing might be overlooked briefly. Two would not.

#

One day, Curly appeared on deck, keeping his head low, blinking a little in the bright sun. Hutch could see by just a glance that he’d fallen asleep. And he had been missed.

Hutch looked away quickly, a terrible sinking feeling growing in his gut. Wilbur was on duty. Hutch squeezed his fists around a rope, and prayed for strength.

Wilbur strode towards the sailor. "Slacking off, sailor?"

He grabbed Starsky’s arm and shoved him against the rail, so he was looking out over the water. "I suppose you think you’re better than the others? Answer me, sailor!"

"No sir."

"No you won’t answer me? Why, you rebellious--!" He whirled Curly around and pressed him even further back, his arm against Curly’s neck, choking him.

"No--no sir, I meant I’m not--better," he barely squeezed the words out; his face was growing purplish.

Hutch was holding his own breath, squeezing his nails into his palms. Dobey had a grip on his shoulder, holding him back. Hutch felt lightheaded, like this was all imaginary, not real. It had to be. They wouldn’t just all stand there and watch him die--would they?

The midshipman pressed against Curly harder, crushing him against the rail. Hutch was breathing open-mouthed, hard and heavy as if he could breathe for both of them. He made a sound in his throat and tried to yank free from Dobey, but the big man held him in an iron grip.

Hutch sucked in a deep breath and opened his mouth to yell--something, anything--probably about bullies. Dobey clamped a hand over his mouth before he could get a word out. "Not now, boy," he whispered in Hutch’s ear. Hutch whimpered a little in his throat, and tried again to get free, but he was helpless in Dobey’s strong, work-hardened grip.

Curly!

Then the midshipman had released Curly, and stepped back. Starsky sagged, halfway crumpling to the ground, holding his throat and gasping in air, leaning forward, looking terribly beaten.

Dobey released Hutch, and he dashed forward the moment he was free, rushing towards Curly’s side. The master caught his arm and flung him back, and raised and aimed his lash, his face angry and disapproving. He didn’t say a word, but Hutch fell back, two stripes burning on his side and back, one on his cheek. He didn’t dare reach up to feel if it was bleeding, but trembling with wrath, fell back into his spot and worked beside Dobey. The big black man sent him a disapproving look, and kept his lips tight with disapproval. He didn’t say a word, but Hutch could hear his silent message anyway. _Don’t you know Curly would want you to stay out of trouble?_

In a few minutes, the still-somewhat-dazed-looking Starsky moved to his appointed task, not far away. His neck still had marks on it from the choking. He kept his curly head down and didn’t seem to even dare look at his friends.

_Oh Curly…Curly…where’s your spirit gone?_

But it had gone the way the rest of the ship’s morale had gone: somewhere far, far away.

He got to see Curly for a moment on the way to mess. He was waiting in line when someone strong and smelly muscled up to him, squeezing into the space between another sailor and Hutch. Hutch had an instant’s impression of lots of hair, a smaller frame than most of the men here, and skinniness, and then Curly’s arm was bumped up against his, they were standing together.

"Your face all right? You all right?" croaked Curly in a painful-sounding voice.

"Yeah. Gonna be all right?" They stood next to each other, eyes forward, not daring to even look at one another; that’s how harsh discipline had gotten.

"Mm-hm," said Curly, very low and unconvincing. Then they moved forward, and the food was served.

Hutch had to work hard to choke down the first few bites. Curly sat next to him, pressed against his side so hard it was almost hard to breathe.

For once, Curly didn’t eat all his meal. His throat must really hurt. He handed Hutch the rest of his hardtack without a word, and Hutch slipped it inside his shirt. Curly was too practical to waste any food, even if he couldn’t eat it himself, and Hutch accepted the kindness as it was meant. At least they both didn’t need to lose weight at the same time.

#

"Me?" said Hutch in an unprofessional squeak. He stepped forward.

"You," said the captain, strutting the deck, leaning on his silver-tipped cane. "You’ve been nothing! But! Trouble! Since you came aboard. I think it’s time for you to leave. We don’t need a Jonah. We don’t need an insurrectionist, a mutiny-inciter, a country bumpkin who doesn’t know anything about the sea on board!" He was now in full, roaring swing.

Hutch blinked at him, feeling desperate and terrible. How could he be singled out, as if all the ship’s troubles were his fault? His hands shook at his sides from the tension and stress; he tried to make them stop.

"You’re going overboard," announced the captain.

Hutch couldn’t speak; he couldn’t breathe. Darkness danced in front of his eyes. They couldn’t--it wasn’t allowed, to just kill someone--was it??

There was a sound from the crew; he could not define it, nor even thinking about it too hard, as all his concentration was taken up with his fate, but it was shocked sound, a sound of murmured disapproval, or possibly something more.

"You gonna throw him overboard?" said Curly abruptly into the silence.

"Silence that man!" roared the captain, whirling, and the master’s mate--thwack, thwack--smacked Starsky with his stick. Curly’s head went down and he stood very still. But his hands were tensing at his sides.

"We’re very close to a tiny unnamed island. You’ll be put there as punishment. If you survive, and your attitude improves, we might pick you up again in a year when next we come this way. That is all."

He whirled on his heel and strutted back to his chair, leaning on the cane less than he had, as if exercising power made him feel stronger.

Hutch stood in a daze until one of the guards plucked his arm and drew him away. They locked him in the holding cell--actually his first time inside, despite all the trouble he’d gotten into--and in the dark he sat, awaiting his fate.

No one came to see him. No one had a word of kindness. He was just alone.

#

It couldn’t have been more than two days, and was probably less, when they came for him. Two guards took him on deck. He blinked and squinted around, feeling like the sun would burn his eyes to oblivion. They led him towards a boat already in the water. Several oarsmen waited inside, sympathy and a grimness on their face. Several people in charge watched the execution with grim faces. He could not see well enough to tell by their eyes if they felt sympathy, if he had any hope for enough supplies.

He blinked around, looking for Curly, but he didn’t see him.

One of the guards gave him a push, not too rough, but he didn’t see it coming and stumbled a little. "In the boat you go," said the man, and they helped him down as if he was still a clumsy landsman, instead of nearly a proper sailor by now. He would have fallen without their help, however.

And then he was in the sloshing launch, the oars creaking and splashing. He blinked around the crowded launch, and someone nudged him and cleared a throat, and then he looked and it fell into place. Here it was; Curly sat next to Hutch. Working one set of oars. One of the people who was stranding him.

He looked into Curly’s eyes and he didn’t know what he saw--purpose, grimness of intent, remoteness. Nothing that helped him. He felt the pleading in his own eyes, the desperation he knew his face must contain. Curly looked back down at the oars and Hutch looked away, ashamed of his lack of any opacity. What could Curly do to get him out of this one, anyway?

It seemed to take forever, yet far too quickly they reached the shore. With a silent, grim intent, they got him unloaded. Hutch had promised himself he wouldn’t cry, but he nearly did. The sailors unloaded the supplies he’d been allowed--rations of water, some hardtack, a knife, his clothes, hammock, and some cloth. And then he was standing here forlorn while they pushed the launch back into the sea, and began to hop in, none of them seeming to have anything to say to him at all.

He wanted to beg someone, anyone…

But there was nothing to beg for, no answers in these men, trapped as much as he was.

He turned, looked around for Curly--somehow lost from his view in the shuffle and hurry--and then he saw him.

Someone else saw him too at the same moment and spoke. "Come on, Davey, back to the ship," he said gruffly. "You haven’t been stranded."

Stranded. That was the word? The word for his probable death sentence ? What did Hutch know about surviving all alone on a little, tiny island?

"Thanks but no thanks," said Curly gruffly, his voice still a little hoarse from his choking. "I’ll stay with Hutch, if it’s all the same to you." His words were casual but his voice grim, and he cocked the gun he held.

"Where’d you get that?" snapped the master’s mate.

"Figured we deserve something to protect ourselves with. Take it out of our pay, you bastard."

None of the other sailors looked surprised in the least. Hutch watched silently to see what would happen. The master’s mate moved forward, frustrated and angry looking. Curly aimed the gun at him. "Try it."

The man hesitated, sweat beading his face as he stared the boy down. Then with an expression of disgust, he whirled back to the launch. "Come on men. He’s not worth his salt anyway."

And back they rowed.

Hutch and Starsky stood on the shore, hearing the waves lap, watching them leave. Starsky watched, his stance rigid, until the launch was back to the boat, and she raised her sails and her anchor and began to float away, an elegant beast with no harm in her to outward eyes, no indication of what a living hell she had become.

Starsky turned to Hutch, and shoved the pistol in the band of his pants. "Hell. I’m glad that’s over with." And he gave Hutch a smile that said he had used up all his bravery and would just have to fake the rest.

Hutch looked at him and sniffed, and rubbed a hand distractedly under his nose. He looked down at the sand. "Shouldn’t have," he said in a vague voice. He sat down on the shore.

"Should’ve," said Starsky. "Don’t worry. They gave us extra hardtack and water. We’ve got friends aboard."

He sat down next to Hutch in the sand. "We oughta see about exploring the island, finding a place to sleep, maybe some fresh water or something before it’s dark." He spoke casually and didn’t move.

Hutch could not speak. He stared at the sand, his eyes welling. Thinking he’d been abandoned--and then having Curly elect to stay--left him feeling very strange indeed. His eyes watered, and he stared at the sand very hard. "Uh-huh," he said.

Partly he thought he should scold Curly. Partly say thank you. But mostly there was just not one word he could get out and it was one of the most awkward, miserable, and unhappy moments of his life. Somehow knowing that Curly now shared his fate--voluntarily--was almost worse than being alone.

"Hey," said Curly softly. He flung an arm around Hutch’s shoulder, and then one hand came up and gave Hutch’s hair a rough, tender rub. "We could just sit here a little bit. That works, too."

Hutch bit his lip, and watched the sand blur in his vision. He leaned forward, feeling sick, wondering if he was going to be sick, thinking he should get up, get away, find some privacy for it, for his horrible feelings, too.

Then he reached out blindly and grabbed Curly’s wrist. He held on as if he were a drowning man.

　

　

　


	15. Chapter 15

　

　

　

Chapter fifteen

　

　

The new world slowly opened up to the two boys. It was very hot, and the sand was coarse and yellowish-brown, white in spots. The weeds and plants grew thickly, difficult to get through; and there were coconut trees. The boys took turn climbing the coconut trees, thumping the coconuts and trying to find out which were ripe. These they cut down, shouting "timber!" or "watch out below!" The coconuts landed in the sand, and had to be prized open for their liquid and their clean-looking, pale flesh.

Hutch was not certain he liked the flavor of either at first, but Curly assured him they were tasty and good for you. Starsky ate them with evident relish, and so Hutch continued to try them until they began to taste better to him.

The boys were not sure which plants were safe to eat. While they tried to figure it out, they kept searching the island for water and more trees. They ate their food as sparingly as they could, and used their water the same.

They worked to catch fish. The sea on one side of the island was quite shallow, with gentle waves. On another side, the sea dropped sharply, turning a strong blue color. This side they fished off. They used bits of thread, unraveled from their clothes, twisted and tied together to made string. They used sticks for poles, insects for bait, and lay on their bellies, watching the water and the fish. And when they caught one, they got as excited as little kids.

When he smiled, Curly’s teeth flashed very white in his face. He was quite tanned, except under his eye patch. Sometimes it shifted, and his skin showed almost white underneath. His eyeless socket had the skin over it, shriveled and shrunken-looking.

Hutch caught a glimpse of it when Curly took his patch off to wash and hung it up over a branch and acted quite fine and normal without it. But Hutch had to work hard to keep his gaze from straying to that pale spot, that shriveled, concave lid. Curly seemed completely comfortable and unselfconscious about it, so Hutch felt bad for noticing, for thinking about it.

He also felt bad that Curly had gotten it saving him. Partly he was afraid of that scar. Partly he had trouble looking away.

But it was often hot and muggy and miserable, and they had to rest in the shade during the hottest part of the day, their faces flushed, not daring to drink as much water as they wanted. The coconuts had to be rationed, too, and when you drank too much, they gave diarrhea.

Plentiful insects bit at night. The boys got desperate enough to plaster their skin with mud to keep them off. In the morning, they’d take a dip into the ocean.

Hutch began trying to teach Curly to swim. And still they had not found a source of freshwater.

They dug; in the middle of the island they began to dig, and, when they went deep enough, the muddy water seeped in sweet, not salty. Now they could survive longer, with seeping water, with coconuts, with their rations and fish and the things they were learning about the ocean and the island.

The island was too small for many creatures, but there were birds, there were tiny lizards. And once they spotted something small at night, with its eyes glowing in the firelight they’d made; it was not a lizard, its eyes glowed the wrong color. Curly said it was probably just a night mouse; but he threw sticks to scare it away.

Hutch protested for the second time, and not convincingly, that he wasn’t scared of a night mouse.

Even though it was just the two of them, and no musical instruments at all, they continued to have music time once a week. They sat around the fire, and took turns singing, sometimes raising their voices in wild shouted sea shanties. Hutch was often too tired to move, much less dance by the end of the long days, but Starsky would get up and do these wild, native-looking dances, as if he belonged to this island, a creature of the earth or sea equally. He’d fling his head back and clap, and dance so wild and free, Hutch wished he had wings on his feet so he could dance so, too.

The abundance of fishes, and the rations of hardtack, and the water they’d found made life livable, but much remained to be done. Proper shelter: their makeshift tents kept blowing down. Better storage for the food: they lost some of the bread to the night-mice; and of course food. They always struggled to stay ahead of hunger. Despite the fish, despite the bread, despite the coconuts. Working so hard they grew desperately, ravenously hungry, and when the fish were small and bony, or the days especially difficult, they struggled to find enough to keep body and soul together. Both boys, already slim, grew skinnier.

Once his initial gratitude and funny feeling about it wore off, Hutch was very glad to have Starsky for company. The curly-headed sailor kept things lively; he was ingenious and could always think of a way to approach or do something; and he was not afraid to fall on his face, and try again, and try and try.

Hutch often found himself standing back awkwardly and watching, wishing he could throw himself into life that way. He’d been trained--or perhaps he’d trained himself?--not to show too much emotion, not to try too hard. It had to look easy, and if it was not, then maybe he should not to do that thing and challenge himself, no matter how fun it looked, no matter how much other boys liked it, because he’d look a fool and a Hutchinson must never look a fool.

But here he wasn’t a Hutchinson…

He was just Hutch.

And sometimes not even that, when the light was gone and there were no words, just two boys sleeping under a bit of sail cloth, trying to stay away from the millions of bugs in the great empty night full and singing with bugs, no human beings for a thousand miles, perhaps. The world was nothing but bugs, and two hungry boys.

"Maybe we could eat bugs," said Starsky once, only half jokingly.

"We'll just fish more," said Hutch. He looked up at Curly, to gauge him. He could tell a lot by looking.

Curly had taken his eye patch off, washed it, and hung it over a tree limb to dry.

He turned back and smiled at Hutch. "What?"

"I feel weird about that." He nodded towards Starsky’s eye.

"What?" Still smiling, Curly raised a hand to touch his face. "Oh. My eye. How come?"

"Well, you wouldn’t have gotten it, if not for me."

"Sure. Because I’d be dead."

#

The first time a gale swept through, they were unprepared. Curly managed to save some of the tent material, but much of their bread got soaked, and, when the days grew hot and dry again, it began to rot and mold.

They cooked what they could salvage, eating it until their stomachs refused to tolerate it. Then, reluctantly, they used the rest for fish bait.

They began to build a raft. A good little raft, but a small one, lashed with vines, with a sail made from one of their ragged cloths; and after that they had to bunk together under the other one, cramped close and hot to escape the bugs.

Sometimes they worked too hard, had to strip down and wade out into the water, hot-faced and flushed, to escape some of the terrible heat. Both boys were deeply bronzed from life aboard ship, but even so Hutch got burned by the sun several times; he seemed to suffer from the heat worse than Curly did.

Curly teased him about it at first; until the day Hutch had to lie in the shade, fevered and barely conscious, recovering from too much sun. His skin was red and peeling for some time afterwards. Curly made him a crazy hat out of a large leaf, and laughed at him when he wore it.

Both boys were losing weight. The island seemed to do strange things to them, but it was worse when they were apart. They rarely were anymore, staying within sight distance of one another, even if they did not speak, sometimes for whole days. It took energy to talk, to laugh and joke, and with less food they had less and less energy. They felt strange apart, but sometimes they needed to get more done than could be done together.

One day Starsky went on one side of the island to fish, and Hutch stayed on the other side, climbing one of the coconut trees. He’d gotten better at it.

Nearly at the top, he paused and looked out at sea, feeling strangely nervous. He gripped the tree as hard as he could. They needed this food, they had to eat more if they wanted to survive long. But all the same, he wished he could have waited. He wished Curly were here, and the silence were not so strange and heavy and threatening. There was nothing wrong on the island; but there was something wrong with him. Something…without food, things seemed to change. Everything got harder and more ominous, more difficult to deal with.

He sighed and continued climbing towards the top. It seemed such a long way, but he couldn’t give up now.

One of his hard, bare feet hit a slippery part; he lost his grip, grabbed for something, anything, and with one scream, fell, sliding down several feet, scraping skin off hands, feet, chest. Then there was just the air, and then the beach. "Help!" he screamed, as he fell, and then everything went dark.

He woke with a terrible pain in his head, lying on the ground, Starsky’s worried face swimming above him, the eye patch doubling and tripling in his view.

Curly dripped some more cold water on his face and neck, and Hutch groaned aloud and tried to wipe it away; he felt queasy and wanted to hurl. Curly supported him gently so he could sit up and lean forward, try to regain his equanimity. His head hurt worse than ever, but nothing was broken.

He continued to feel sick off and on for several days, and the ringing in his head did not completely go away for over a week. He felt battered and bruised, and even more tired than before. He walked like a stooped old man because his back hurt, and had to rest a lot.

The work was hard for Curly without as much help. Hutch worried about him. They were both too thin already, and now poor Curly worked harder than ever. But Hutch had to keep sitting down to rest, or the pounding in his head made him cry out and clutch it.

It was nearly a week before it went away for good, and he woke up one morning with his headache completely gone. He sighed, and stretched his arms, breathing deep of the fresh, greenery-and-sea-salt air.

As soon as he told Curly, the boy’s face relaxed in a wide smile. "Oh good," he said, and put an arm around Hutch’s shoulder and clapped him on the back. Hutch realized with a pang just how much of the pinched, tensed look on Curly’s face had been because of him….

　

　

　


	16. Chapter 16

　

Chapter sixteen

　

　

　

His eyesight had always been pretty good, but now he relied on it more than ever, because he still did not always hear things clearly. When the surf was high, he could miss something Curly said behind his back even if he were standing nearby and speaking in a normal or loud voice.

He simply didn’t hear it. Curly was nice about these times; Hutch blamed the background noise, and Curly never seemed to hold it against him, once he understood.

The first time it happened he seemed rather upset with Hutch for some reason, and when Hutch asked him what was wrong, he said, "Oh, you’re talking to me, now?"

Then it came out; Hutch apologized, said he hadn’t heard him over the surf, and after that, Curly would often walk around in front of him to say something to him, and give him a smile, moving his mouth distinctly with each word, slightly exaggerated to make it easier to follow.

They also developed a series of hand signals to make communication easier. It especially helped over distances. At first he did not realize how much they had come to rely on these hand signals, until Curly hurt himself chopping wood. He twisted his hand, spraining it, and had to manage for the next several days using it as little as possible. And Hutch found to his dismay that Curly was harder for him to understand; he had to look at his face more, squinting worriedly, concerned that Curly was upset with him. Starsky often wore a frown, because of the pain in his hand, but he promised Hutch he was not upset (shaking his head and mouthing the words carefully).

At least he could still hear Curly when they were close together and the landscape was reasonably quiet of background noises. Sometimes they talked at night, if they had enough to eat, if they were not tired enough to sleep right away, or if the bugs were bad enough to keep them awake.

Lying there, under their tent under the trees under the stars, they talked about the dreams they’d held, the boyhood dreams now but wistful memories.

Hutch was going to breed horses, beauties, fast-movers, gorgeous beasts with gentle tempers, thunderous gallops, and fast as the wind. Curly was going to open his own food shop, and there would always be enough to eat. He would never go hungry again.

Crab season came. Little claw-clacking creatures swarmed ashore, seemingly from all directions, heading inland, digging holes in the sand for their eggs.

The boys, half-starved, caught them by the dozens, boiled and cracked them with zest, eating until they could not eat another bite of the succulent meat. The crabs were a small, ferocious breed, so it took many of them to make a meal, much less satisfy the boys’ hunger. But there was a profusion of them, a confusion of crabs, far too many crabs; they could have eaten all day and not put a dent in them.

At night, the crabs climbed into and over the tent, and when they found skinny arms or toes, they pinched, sending Curly or Hutch awake with a yelp, thrashing about to free themselves from the little beasts.

Soon, waking up every hour or so when a crab made it past their defenses, they took to sleeping in trees.

But far too soon, crab season ebbed. The creatures finished their implacable tasks and began to disappear. Some were eaten; some died, lying belly-up on the sand, and some went away into the water. Hutch and Curly killed or captured as many as they could, but the meat stayed fresh only so long. The crabs would not keep well in captivity; they fought one another far too readily. Once dead, the flesh quickly went bad in the heat.

The boys preserved some of them by storing the bodies in a great pit filled with briny sea water, dug at careful expense of energy, but this only brought them another week of fresh meat, and then the crabs were gone, and this surprising burst of food with it. They were back to hunger and too-few coconuts, and the thin, bony fish.

Curly took to wading out further and further, and using more and more outlandish bits of bait, hoping to catch large fish. He was quite determined. It was both pleasant and funny to see him with his tongue sticking out of the side of his mouth, his face, his whole body tensed with concentration as he stood very, very still in the water, as deep as he could go, waiting for a fish to take a fancy to his bait.

Work on their raft had not proceeded very far. Most of their energy was required to get food, and neither had very good raft-building skills. Curly said they needed to lash logs together. They had nearly enough logs now, but were still trying to figure out how to lash them together without using up their rope, which did not seem like enough anyway.

Hutch was experimenting in model format, and helping to fish, barely keeping his eye on his line as he wrapped thread around twigs, trying to make a workable little raft, when he heard a shriek.

He looked up and dropped his work and ran towards Curly. He had walked out till he stood in deep water again. Now he was trying desperately to get back to shore. A fin cut through the water behind him, a shark’s fin.

Hutch flung himself at the waves, mindless now of everything but Curly. Curly was still stumbling, trying to run in the now-so-shallow shallows. Starsky had not properly learned to swim yet, although he’d nearly mastered floating and could stay above the water for nearly ten minutes at a stretch before he got restless and begin to sink himself, quite unintentionally.

He babbled something, but Hutch could not hear it; sound was obscured anyway by the water as he swam all out towards the attacker. He should’ve brought a knife, if he had a knife, but they’d left the knife and the ax back at base camp.

Curly was shouting something, waving for him to go back. He stumbled, as though bumped by something from behind, and the fin was there, and Curly was there, and then Hutch was there, and he drew back a fist and smashed it into a small gray nose, of a flat-nosed, stubby shark with hard, flat eyes. His knuckles scraped and bleeding against the hard flesh of the shark, he hit it again, and the shark writhed, opening its mouth as if in a silent cry of pain.

Curly screamed, and dragged on his arm, and the two of them stumbled towards the shallows, as the shark whipped in a dazed circle.

They washed it thrash in the shallow for a moment, both heaving for breath from shore, Hutch coughing (he’d swallowed water in all the excitement) and Curly trembling all over.

Hutch reached for him, to envelop him in comforting arms, but Curly pushed him away. "We can catch it. If we hurry." He turned and ran in his hard bare feet, dripping wet, back to base camp.

Hutch watched him wearily, and then plopped to a seat on the sand. He examined his cut knuckles; not too bad. The skin of a shark must be hard indeed to have such an effect. It hadn’t even been that big of a shark.

The fin had drifted further out to sea by the time Curly arrived again, almost stumbling over the uneven ground in his haste. He was carrying a length of their rope and a crude hook, his biggest one. One the end he’d stuck a precious piece of their last fish. Hutch gave him a slightly censorious look—that was supposed to be their supper, if they couldn’t catch anything—but Curly showed his teeth in a quick, nervous grin, and threw it out. He made quite a splash of it, bloodying the water with the fresh fish.

Hutch rose to his feet, his heart pounding hard. The fin was returning…

Curly stayed in the shallows, and played the hook for all his worth, trying to keep it at the end of the line and give the shark more play. There was a flash of the fin, a flurry of water, and then Curly gave a sharp tug and pulled; the shark was caught. Together, they pulled it ashore, and let it die, flopping and then lying still, its flat eyes going flatter. Hutch stared in fascination, both repulsed and fascinated by the thing that had frightened them both so badly, and now would be their supper.

It turned out the fin was the only thing that was edible without being soaked in saltwater overnight. They had to wait to use the rest of the creature. That night they dined on the best part, made into a great pot of boiling stew, leaves and coconut and coconut milk, a few crumbs of hardtack, and the succulent flesh of shark-fin.

They ate like kings, full for once.

The shark lasted nearly two weeks.

But it did not come without its price. Somehow in his hurry to reach Curly and the shark, Hutch had not only swallowed water wrong, he’d become ill. Soon his throat and head throbbed, painful and dreadful.

At first the pain was a dull thing, bearable, and he bore it stoically as he could, smiling and shrugging off Curly’s worry, hoping it would be gone in a few days.

But it was not; it stole his appetite, it consumed his waking hours and shortened and troubled his sleeping ones until Curly was frantic with worry. The illness grew worse, and Hutch hot with fever. Panting for relief, he had strange dreams, trying not to thrash about and cry out in pain. Worse and worse it grew.

They only had so much laudanum—a half a bottle, to be rationed out over the next long months. But when Hutch lay curled on his side in agony, holding his head, unable to sleep, Curly insisted he take some.

Curly doctored him with the laudanum, using it to ebb his pain, using it to dull him to a drugged, restless sleep, and always, when Hutch awoke, Curly was there, fear standing out on his face like naked bones. He would hold Hutch’s hand, try to make him comfortable, talk gently to him, and give him laudanum. When it ran out, he could not even do that.

#

It was one of his rare lucid moments, and he wanted to say goodbye.

His condition could not go on like this, growing worse every day, and he survive. They both knew it, and it was time to say goodbye while he still could.

One of them had to be brave and say it. And the way he felt right now, death didn’t sound so terrible. It was as if his whole head was afire. He was sometimes in the present, other times reliving nightmares or the past—the terrible days at home when his father had been angry and everyone had tiptoed around, hoping not to become the target of that anger. The days on shipboard when the men had been beaten quixotically for little or no fault. The days when Curly had been ill, after he’d lost his eye.

"I’m sorry, Curly, but I need to say goodbye." He stopped to pant, gritting his teeth against the pain until it ebbed enough for him to speak again.

Curly was sitting over him, tears standing out in his eyes, shaking his head, mouthing ‘no.’ Hutch could hear him only faintly over the pounding in his head, but he could see the word clearly enough.

Starsky held one of Hutch’s hands in both his, one beneath, one over it, covering it, as if to protect him somehow, that way.

Hutch reached up his other hand—a little shakily, for he had grown very, very weak—and touched Curly’s face. "I’m glad you’ll… live. You’re tough. You’ll make it, and with one person, the island’s food will last longer—"

Curly cut him off, shaking his head wrathfully, saying a quick burst of something.

Hutch waited it out patiently, breathing shallowly to avoid the pain as much as he could. He could feel it coming back, a great tidal wave of pain ready to overtake his reason; perhaps even the final one, although he supposed he would not know until it was here, or maybe even then, until it was over…

Curly finished talking and started to cry, burying his head on Hutch’s hand, the one he held. His tears were getting it wet. Seemed a sad waste for Curly to waste the water. Hutch’s eyes felt wet too, but he knew he must be brave, meet death like a man, gamely, to give his friend strength to face whatever came next.

"Bury me next to a big tree, if you can. Maybe you can make the raft, and sail away and meet some natives who might h-help you." He gasped at the pain, a sharp terrible burst, indescribably awful.

It wouldn’t be long now; not many words left. He’d better get them out. He could feel the darkness drawing nearer, hovering, waiting for him—madness and pain, and then, perhaps, the relief of death.

"And I love you and I hope you have a great life, and I never meant what I said. You’re not ugly. You care about people and you stick up for what you believe in and you…you have the most wonderful smile." His eyes were leaking now, too, as he tried to take back, to undo the words he’d so often wished unsaid.

He wished he could say the rest of it— _one eye or two, you’ll always be good-looking_ —but the words would not come now, he could only pant, tears tracking down his face, tears of frustration and pain and goodbye.

Curly held his hand, saying something, but Hutch’s vision dimmed, he could not even guess what Curly said now.

Just so long as Curly stayed with him, until the end. It was a lot to ask, but he couldn’t help asking it. He didn’t want to die alone. He tightened his hand in Curly’s grip.

Then, incredibly, Curly pulled free. Hutch could not see or feel where he had gone; he reached for him and made a sort of pleading sound; he could not speak. But his hand found nothing, and he let it fall back.

Curly…please come back! Not alone. I can’t stand it, if I have to be alone…

And then Curly was back, holding his hand again, patting and squeezing it reassuringly.

He was still there when Hutch slipped into the blessed darkness.

　

　


	17. Chapter 17

　

Chapter seventeen

　

　

He awoke in the sickbay, the doctor standing over him worriedly, peering down.

His pain had stopped. He felt very weak and nearly human again. He stretched, and wondered if this were all a dream, or perhaps the other was a dream, the island and the shark and dying, and Curly crying over him. It felt all very far away now. Perhaps it had been a laudanum nightmare, and he had dreamed it all—everything, every moment of Curly’s friendship—and he was back on the ship.

Ah, but that was true, at least: he felt the sway of the ship that he could never forget now.

The doctor gave him water laced with something sharp-tasting, and smiled down at him with a reassuring look. "You will live," he said. And, now that his head had stopped pounding, Hutch could hear him faintly, just like normal—hard to hear, but not impossible.

Hutch fell asleep again before he could ask about Curly. He found his dreams were troubled. If he had only imagined his loyalty...

Even at the cost of everything that had come with it, he would not trade that for worlds.

#

He awoke with the familiar pressure of a hand in his, a hand that fit fairly well—was about the same size as his, neither a child’s nor an adult’s, but somewhere in between. As he awoke, the hand gave his a squeeze, and then he opened his eyes to behold the cheerfully smiling one-eyed wonder, Curly, and his dark eye patch, looking very much alive and quite real.

His face lit up at the sight of Hutch’s open eyes, and he pulled his hand free and began to babble, using his voice and his hands both to convey his message, which was, essentially, this:

"They came for us, Hutch! Can you believe it? Captain got sick, hadda be put off on a ship headed home. The lieutenant took over, and things calmed down. He put Wilbur and his wife ashore as soon as possible, and now the ship’s happier. Nobody causin’ trouble. She was getting up to all sorts of mischief with us gone, Hutch. Didn’t have us to pick on anymore, so she hadda find new people, and Wilbur kept getting worse and worse." He looked grim for a moment, then brightened. "But they’re ashore now, and stuck with each other—and we’re here, the ship came back for us.

"They got there just as you were nearing the end. That’s why I had to let go of your hand, Hutch. I had to wave for them, show them where to land. Then the doctor came and he took care of you, gave you medicines and more laudanum, so you could stop hurting. He said the pain was making it worse, that you could heal better if you weren’t in constant pain. And you have, look, Hutch, you can smile and everything." He brought a hand up and affectionately patted the side of Hutch’s face.

They grinned at each other for a moment, feeling soppy, feeling that they’d gotten a reprieve too great for words, and gripped each other’s hand warmly. They did not need words to appreciate the magnitude of this salvation.

#

Things went back to normal surprisingly quickly aboard. Once Hutch’s initial crisis was past, he improved rapidly, so that in a few days’ time he could come on deck and see the crew.

They were all touchingly glad to see him.

The atmosphere of the ship was much happier, with the lieutenant (now acting captain), maintaining an easy, calm sort of discipline that neither let anyone feel they could slack off with impunity, nor had people in fear of being whipped. The worst punishment that had been meted out recently was the removal of a man’s grog for three days. And he had quite learnt his lesson from it.

Curly was everywhere at once, it seemed. He seemed so alive, so zestful of life. He was still a ragged skin-and-bones stick figure, but they couldn’t keep him out of the rigging, or from helping his friends haul ropes and perform their duties. At last the ship quit trying, and he was reinstated, at full pay.

Hutch took a little longer as he needed more time to recover, but soon he too resumed his duties as a sailor.

They were both far too thin and ate like a couple of horses. The cook quite babied them at first, fixing soups that their stomachs would be able to handle, then moving on gradually to meats and stews, and a kind of coconut bread-pudding.

It seemed that no matter how much they ate, they couldn’t gain back weight; it was all very slow going, even if they ate enough for four men some days. Fortunately, the ship had been newly victual’d in port, and there was plenty of food. Even when they ate more than their allotment, somehow there was always enough—donations from the men, special treats saved from the cook, etc. In this way, though they still looked like starvelings, they actually ate better than anyone aboard but the lieutenant.

The boys were very grateful that the ship had come back for them. "We’re lucky the captain got so sick," said Curly once to Hutch.

Hutch nodded and smiled back. He thought so, too.

Until the day he saw Dobey and the doctor talking. They were halfway across the ship, just talking regularly. The wind was quite busy and most people had to shout to be heard. They were standing by themselves, far away from anyone else, and appeared to be talking quietly to one another, calmly, leaning towards one another to be heard.

Dobey’s back was towards Hutch, so he could only see the doctor’s face. Hutch was tugging ropes with the best of them, doing his part with a will to prepare for the squall. He smiled a little to see the two men talking together so friendly. He hadn’t known they were friends and was glad to think they might be. He turned back to the ropes, not sparing any more attention for them—and then his head came up again sharply.

One of the doctor’s words had just registered. The distance across the ship, the noisiness of the storm, none of that made any difference. Hutch could ‘hear’ a clearly spoken word by watching a mouth’s movement. Of course, if the person was speaking quickly, or large and unfamiliar words, that made it harder, and he often got things wrong…

But this word had been quite simple. It had been ‘poison.’

#

He approached Dobey about it, but not for a couple of days. Somehow he was afraid to talk to Starsky about it, when he had maybe been wrong anyway. Part of him wanted to just forget it, but in the end he could not: he talked to Dobey.

He waited until they were alone on deck one day, far separated from any others, and then he tugged the big man’s sleeve and looked up at him. He said just one word quietly and looked at Dobey, not trusting himself, or somehow daring, to say anything more.

Dobey’s face went instantly blank, and then rather hard. He grabbed Hutch’s arm and turned him away, to face the sea, and looked around quickly. "Who’s been talking to you, boy?"

He spoke clearly, at least: Hutch could hear him, didn’t even have to read his lips. He shook his head, sheepish. "You and the doctor, I saw you talking," he said.

"Keep your voice down." Dobey looked around again, his expression dark with concern. He kept a firm grip on Hutch’s arm. It almost hurt. He looked around again. "All right, boy. I’ll tell you."

"Can you tell me and Curly at the same time?"

Dobey hesitated a moment, frowning. And then he nodded.

Hutch breathed a sigh of relief. Whatever the secret was—and he had the sinking feeling he already knew—he wanted Curly to hear it, too. There were no secrets between them.

"I’ll get him." He tugged free from Dobey’s arm and ran, wild and barefoot in his ragged trousers—nearly shirtless today, as it was falling apart, and with his longish braid flapping against his back like a rope.

He found Curly below, coiling ropes and listening to a big fish story. He waited by the entrance of the room until Curly glanced up at him, then jerked his head towards deck. Curly put down his ropes, stood up, and followed him.

The two of them slipped away together and joined Dobey’s.

He regarded them half affectionate and fond, half disapproving. He pointed to Curly’s shirt, with the stain on it—Starsky tugged it sort of straighter—and then frowned at Hutch’s holey shirt, which had been repaired many times and yet still needed much work. Hutch shrugged sheepishly.

"Tell us?" he said.

Dobey swallowed rather hard. He turned out to sea, and drummed his fingers for a moment on the side of the ship, then he turned back, looking fierce. "I don’t see as it’s any of your business," he began.

Hutch just waited. Curly stood by his side, looking clueless.

"But you may as well know, since Hutch had to go and figure things out anyway." He frowned at the both of them, angrily and somehow sadly, too. Was there guilt mixed in his expression, as well?

Hutch slipped his hand into Curly’s. Somehow he did not want Curly to feel alone when he heard this.

Dobey took a deep breath. "I poisoned the captain. Well, not me alone—the surgeon and the cook helped me." He crossed his arms, looking for a moment very much like someone who could poison a captain in cold blood.

Both boys blinked at him. Curly jerked a little and moved forward. "Dobey?" Dobey frowned at him.

Hutch kept hold of his hand, and tugged him back. "Let’s hear the rest of it," he said, hoping he spoke quietly. They were alone right now but even so it would not do to have any raised voices that could perhaps be overheard.

Dobey looked around again. They were still alone. "Things were going from bad to worse aboard." He spoke clearly, and slowly, obviously making an effort so that Hutch could hear him, too. And he did, catching most of the words and interpreting the rest. Dobey was easier to understand than many people, partly because Hutch knew him so well, and partly because he spoke very clearly, not rushing through words, sentences, or phrases.

"The crew was close to mutiny. With you boys gone, nothing was the same—and Wilbur and his wife lost their targets. Henrietta began turning her attentions on other sailors, trying to cause trouble, and Wilbur went from bad to worse, raging and hitting and instigating whippings for little or no reason.

"Not that there was no reason: everyone was slowing down, purposely causing trouble, deliberately working at a snail’s pace when not directly under supervision. The captain made no effort to win the crew’s loyalty back. Many men’s backs were beaten for no more than being in the wrong place at the wrong time. The mutiny talk was growing. I knew that if something wasn’t done, there would be revolt.

"I, the doctor, and the cook came up with a plan together. Every day I would slip a little of one of the doctor’s medicines that he would give me to the cook, who would put it in the captain’s food. Not enough to kill him, but enough to make him sicker, so that he must take to his bed, and could not come on deck and continue to make things worse."

The boys stared at him. He stared back. He crossed his arms.

"Yes, I did it for you, too. When the ship took the captain away, and then we docked at the nearest port, the lieutenant put the married couple ashore and peace returned to the ship. Things were still tensed—but he turned the ship around immediately and we came back for you boys. He said that you had learned your lesson. We all believed that he thought like we did, that the punishment was a wicked one, imposed unfairly by the captain.

"And so we rescued you. And you survived, and I am not sorry. I would have done worse. I would do anything to rescue my wife and my children—and I would do anything for you boys, as well." He turned away, a very fierce, almost angry or sullen look on his face—but he did not turn away quickly enough to hide the quick wetness that shone in his eyes.

He stared out at sea, as if he meant to look out at it for a long, long time.

Hutch looked at Curly, and Curly looked at Hutch. Hutch gave his hand a squeeze and then released it. They moved to either side of Dobey by unspoken agreement, and each took one of his arms.

And Curly said Dobey had been more of a father to him in many ways than his own, and he loved him too, and didn’t care…maybe it had been wrong, but they were so grateful, so grateful to be alive, to have the ship come back for them, to be taken back aboard, home, and thank you, thank you, and they would never tell.

　

　

　


	18. Chapter 18

　

Chapter eighteen

　

Hutch raised his nose to the wind and inhaled deeply. Ah, the scent of land! That sweet, sweet smell: it smelled like home.

He watched with a gleeful grin on his face as the ship drew nearer and nearer to the home port. Now it was nearer—now nearer yet—and the steeples of churches and the masts of ships at dock grew larger.

He leaned over the edge and grinned and grinned.

A hand grabbed his elbow and yanked. Hutch turned his smile on Curly. He pointed eagerly towards the land, his eyebrows rising.

Curly frowned a little. "Don’t fall over!"

Hutch laughed at him. "Don’t worry, I won’t. I’m a regular sailor now."

Curly rolled his eyes, exaggeratedly high, as if asking the seagulls what he was supposed to do with such an awful liar.

#

The ship docked, the cargo unloaded, the pay was distributed, the leave given.

It was a carnival air, a jubilant day. Soldiers set out eagerly, ready to go home (if they had a home), others in packs, ready to kick up their heels on the town, which was waiting to accept their money.

Into the great, swelling sea of humanity two boys strode, followed by a large, scowling man with a dark face and intimidating manner. Dobey was not comfortable off the ship, but he said someone had to keep an eye on the boys.

"Chicken! Look!" Curly tugged Hutch towards a food stand, pungent with the smell of barbequed meat. Grinning, he held up three fingers.

Dobey scowled, muttering something with the word "wasting money" in it, and Hutch shuddered, remembering his last brush with seaside chicken. But Curly would not be put off. "You’ll love it," he promised them both, and paid for the food himself, grinning happily at the daughter of the man who ran the stand, and accepting all three newspaper-wrapped meat treats himself. Then he had to juggle them, his smile growing somewhat pained, because they were really quite hot, and one person couldn’t easily hold three.

Hutch laughed at him, and Dobey quickly took them from him, scolding good-naturedly.

The three of them went to sit on the pier while they ate, looking out over the water, at the profusion of boats, ships, sloops, and dinghies on the water, on the bustling shoreline.

Hutch sat picking at his chicken. He looked down into the water, thumping his feet against the dock, feeling like a little kid again. He glanced at Curly—good, he wasn’t watching. Dobey and Starsky were holding an avid conversation, gesturing to ships and each other with broadly.

Curly took a break to grab a big bite of chicken and then went back to talking. It looked like they were discussing the relative merits of two ships of the same size. They were turned towards each other, so it was hard to see their faces, and they were both talking rather fast, as well, getting quite into their discussion of these two ships.

One of the ships in the harbor, Hutch realized with a start, was their own, the _Bonhomme_. He hadn’t recognized it at first. How odd; he must not be quite the sailor he’d imagined he’d become.

For a moment, that realization left him quite shattered. Although he didn’t know why he should want to be a sailor, after what the life had done with him—nearly killed him several ways, made him more deaf—and—

He glanced over at Dobey and Curly.

—given him friends he could always count on. People who would stand by his side no matter what, people who would die for him if need be. He found himself smiling, and he stopped feeling left out. Curly could tell him what the conversation was about later, if it was at all interesting.

He smiled down into his lap, and picked a small piece off his chicken, and dropped it into the water for the hungry fish swirling in the shadows.

A few minutes later, he hung over the water, smiling down at the swirling splashes of silver, the fish fighting over his chicken bits. He lay on his stomach, his feet kicking in the air, and dropped another piece. He’d near used it up, and hadn’t eaten a bite. It did smell rather tasty, but he couldn’t smell barbecued chicken without remembering the sick feeling he’d gotten from it last time. He’d wait, and eat some nice fish. Perhaps that big silver one…

Hm, perhaps he had time to go buy a line and hook, the way they were still at it, arguing or debating about something. It was warm here on the dock, the sun beating down pleasantly on his back, even warming his bare soles in the air.

He kicked his feet together once, and laughed as a particularly large fish jumped partway out of the water to grab a morsel before it could hit the wet.

He sensed silence beside him; he sensed them staring. He turned slowly to check, still smiling—and sure enough, they were regarding him in a kind of thunderstruck silence. Curly’s mouth hung open. Dobey quickly shut his.

Then Curly began to sputter. "Wh-wh-WHAT are you doing?! I paid good money for that chicken!" he fumed. He grabbed away what was left—mostly bones, and a bit of breast meat—and glared at Hutch.

Hutch sat up, tossing his hair back, and laughed at him. He looked so indignant, like one of his pet chickens that had gotten its feathers out of place, or had a favorite bit of corn stolen. Hutch grinned at him, at that dear, indignant face.

Starsky crouched over the chicken, ripping off a piece of meat and chewing it, then peering over the dock and into the water, glaring suspiciously down at the zealous fish that still swished below, awaiting another feeding frenzy.

Dobey was trying not to laugh as well, by the look of it. He looked away, putting a hand to his twitching mouth as if covering a cough. Then he smiled at Hutch over Curly’s back and reached over and gave him an affectionate pat on the shoulder. "It’s good to hear you laugh, boy. It’s been too long."

"Has it?" Hutch’s brown wrinkled with the thought. Didn’t he laugh anymore? He was almost sure he laughed… "I’m sorry."

Curly gave him a quick smile, forgetting to be angry over the chicken. "Don’t be sorry. Just be you." He put a warm hand on Hutch’s knee and gave him a friendly little shake.

Hutch smiled back. Yeah—be himself. With two dear friends, and a shipload of friends, and a wealth of experience as a sailor and everything he’d learned about life.

Curly smiled at him again and threw an arm around his shoulder. "You want to get something else to eat? Maybe fish?"

Hutch nodded happily. "You read my mind!"

The three of them got to their feet, dusted themselves off, and headed back down to the bustling, silent roar of commerce, and food, and life.

Hutch lingered for a moment to stare down at the swirling fish, then ran and caught up with the other two, with half a skip in his step.

He shoved between them and grabbed hold of their arms. They both turned to smile at him, and Curly reached over to ruffle his hair and give him a friendly little nudge. His eyes sparked warmth and good humor, and that required no words.

The life of three sailing men could change a lot, in a short time, Hutch realized. And he didn’t even know yet whether all three were going to sign on again to the same ship, or do something else. But just for the moment, he didn’t care. They were here, they were alive—and they were going to have fish.

　

　

　

<<<>>>


End file.
